HIGH LIFT JACK RECOVERY, April 2020

Despite my avowed dislike of high-lift jacks (they are unstable and dangerous), I needed to use one recently for a very unusual rescue. It was the second recovery job in a week during early March. The first was a Prado which smashed its centre diff bouncing through diagonal holes on a steep climb – past participants on our training courses would recognise this situation from our wheel lift exercise.

However the second recovery was a VW Amarok which lost brakes on a steep descent apparently due to a HDC (Hill Descent Control) malfunction. It had plunged off the track on a bend, hitting a tree head-on and finished perched on a huge log of about 600mm diameter. The recovery involved felling the tree in front of the bumper and cutting a new forward route to rejoin the 4WD track further down the hill. However the tricky bit was removing the log from underneath. Some delicate chainsaw work dissected the log into three sections, with the middle bit being rolled out from under the back of the Amarok. Then to remove the front section, on which the rear axle was resting, the vehicle had to be supported on the jack while we dug under both ends of the section of log, enabling me to spin it around with a winch. Then after removing the back wheel we had clearance to roll the log out from underneath. The wheel was then replaced, and the vehicle was delicately lowered to the ground using the high-lift jack!

Of course since late March everything has ground to a halt with the stage 3 pandemic restrictions, and that comes after a major curtailment of our trips over summer as a result of the bushfires. The word ‘unprecedented’ has been getting a lot of use lately! Between these two crises Anne and I did manage to run a popular ‘Delatite Discovery’ tag-along trip during the Labour Day long weekend, with some awesomely spectacular tracks overlooking Eildon Reservoir, including a great base-camp. Other good news is that Marcus has had surgery and is on the road to recovery. So what’s ahead? We have training courses, and some tag-along trips, but no dates!! Below is a list which you may express interest in, but we cannot confirm yet.