On Sunday September 25th some of the Mountaineers went out on a recovery to one of our Adopt-a-Trails, Kelly Flats to recover a rolled Toyota Tocoma from Heart Attack Hill.
Fortunately this recovery was also done with the driver of the vehicle present, as from looking at the vehicle you would not think anyone could of survived. They rolled an estimated 12-15 times ending up roughly 600' from the first roll. The driver was ejected about 1/2 way down while the passenger was inside for the entire ride. They both were extremely lucky as this could of ended much worse then it did. Both walked away with only cuts and bruises. There ordeal started with attempting Heart Attack hill when the vehicle stalled and begun to roll backwards. The rear tire went into a hole causing them to loose control and slide sideways starting the rollover.
Recovery Vehicles were positioned off-trail to make the recovery safer with permission from the Forest Service, this by no means says it is ok to go off trail and should never do so without permission from the proper people.
They roll started just below the largest tress on the ridge.
Stretching out winch lines and straps, it was about 250' from the trail to the vehicle.
Here is where is started, several people were tasked with picking up all the debris.
We used 4 rigs to winch the vehicle up. Two pulling with two as anchors to keep them from moving. Maybe a little overkill but we wanted to make it as easy as possible.
More debris cleanup
Vehicle turned and starting up the hill.
We would pull for a while and then remove straps, reattach, and let the winches cool.