Tandem Recovery Tackles 44,000-Pound Steel Load

By George L. Nitti

When a new driver mistakenly turned into the wrong driveway and buried his 44,000-pound load of steel plates in a soft ditch off Amnicola Highway, Doug Yates Towing and Recovery was dispatched.  

The call came in as a basic winch-out, but once tow operator Scotty Ward arrived on scene, it was clear that wouldn’t cut it. The trailer had veered off the culvert, and the tractor’s fuel tanks were kissing the ground. Ward radioed in: “We’re going to need the rotator.”

“I knew right away — steel, soft ground, a leaning trailer — this wasn’t going to be a one-truck job,” said Julio Castro, the other lead operator who appeared on scene with the company rotator.

With Ward’s 30-ton wrecker positioned on the low side, and the rotator working from a traffic lane, Yates’s team executed a precise and synchronized lift-and-pull recovery. Using five-eighths chain anchored to the trailer frame, they leveled the load, then lifted and swung it safely back onto the pavement while pulling it forward simultaneously.

The trailer, loaded with steel plates strapped with nylon — not chains, per manufacturer request — presented a serious hazard. “Steel is tricky,” Castro explained. “If it shifts, it can come off the trailer. One wrong move, and we’ve got a bigger mess and major safety concerns.”

Further complicating the job were soft, recently flooded grounds and overhead power lines. Even walking in the ditch required caution — “You’d slide right to the bottom,” Castro said. Despite those challenges, the team completed the recovery in under 30 minutes.

The driver, a rookie just weeks into solo operations, misjudged the turn while following GPS — a growing issue in the area. “They train for two months and turn them loose. A lot of them don’t know how to approach these deliveries,” said Castro, who had to personally reposition the truck into the lot after the driver froze up.

For tow operators, Castro emphasized three critical takeaways: respect the load — especially when it’s steel, know your surroundings — from soft ground to power lines, and prioritize safety — every step of the way.