Joy Wiebe, Haul Road Trucker

We are sad beyond words to learn of the death of Joy Wiebe.  She was a beautiful vibrant soul who brought cheer to the lives of many a trucker on the Dalton Highway.  Jack considered her a good friend, not just a fellow trucker.  Many an afternoon or evening was whiled away on the road in conversation about this or that, always a positive experience with Joy who improved the mood of each day and situation she was in.  Full of energy, always wanting to be a better person, the world lost an asset the day she died.

I was able to meet Joy in Coldfoot about 2 months ago.  I liked her immediately.  Her smile and attitude were kind and open.  She was a humble person, small of stature but strong and able and energetic.  She touched my life for only a couple of minutes yet I find myself crying for a person I barely knew.  Why Joy had to go and why her family has to now be overcome by grief and the question of how they can go on, we’ll never know.  We can only feel deep sadness and pain at a world without her.

Jack and I send our deepest sympathies to the family of Joy Wiebe.  We cannot imagine their grief.  We want them to know that this trucker, as well as so many others, thought the world of Joy.  She was a shining beam of light on a dark night, on the Haul Road.  She was a Joy.

Obituary

Anchorage Daily News Article





 

Pushing a crane

It’s quite common for a really heavy load to have one or more push trucks behind it to push when going up inclines.  Push trucks are commonly used on the Dalton Highway as well as the Parks and Richardson when the loads are outrageously heavy, otherwise it would take a very long time and so much fuel for the truck with the load to get up a mountain, and it would also impede traffic for long periods of time.  The push trucks just follow the load when not going up hills.

Taken 11 years ago, these photos really show how close Jack’s push truck gets to the load he’s pushing (a crane).  You can see the pad that the push bar pushes against, how the trucks make contact.

Driving the Dalton

Jack finally took a video of driving down the road.  It seems like a silly thing to do but people have requested more videos and this one shows what most of his job is like, on the good days.  🙂

(If these appear blurry change your resolution settings on the bottom right side of the player.)

 

Happy New Year!!