Alaska: Avalanche on the Haul Road!

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Updated Apr 9, 2021
Click through the image for more photography from recent Dalton Highway avalanches in the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner courtesy of Ed Davis.Click through the image for more photography from recent Dalton Highway avalanches in the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner courtesy of Ed Davis.

Never a dull moment on the Haul Road, Alaska’s Dalton Highway through ultra-rugged terrain out to Prudhoe Bay oil operations. Six-to-eight recent, rather odd slush avalanches, the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reported over the weekend, led to what you see in the photo above, one of at least two such instances involving haul rigs in Atigun Pass. No one was injured in either of the cases, fortunately, but it points to the myriad dangers driver face there, made apparent for many around the world in recent years, of course, in the Ice Road Truckers series. (Season 3 followed drivers operating there, as did, in part, Seasons 5 and 6.) One Haul Road regular who’s impressed her magnanimity upon an array of U.S. humanity well beyond the trucking world, Carlile Transportation driver Lisa Kelly, is the subject of a feature in this month’s Overdrive, well on its way to subscribers’ mailboxes. (Also included in this issue: profiles of our Most Beautiful contestants, strategies for coping with the California emissions regulations, custom rigs and plenty of discussion of the new hours rule, set to go into effect July 1.)

Kelly is back on the Ice Road Truckers show with the new season, starting up this Sunday on History, this time around running new routes on Canadian ice roads in Manitoba. Stay tuned to the site here for the full feature about her, going live tomorrow and tracing her path toward trucking through childhood motocross racing, pizza delivery, school bus driving and on to the growing trucking veteran’s role she seems to be playing on the show. For now, here’s a look at the June cover (below) to tide you over.

Hopefully no chance of an avalanche where you are. Stay safe out there!

Lisa Kelly on Overdrive June 2013 cover

 

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