The ice road truckers has been on discovery channel over here in Australia,
Hugh wouldn’t be your average Canadian employer, he wouldn’t get away in Australia with that ■■■■■■■■ that he gets away with over there.
They give fines out for speeding and talk safety but let Hugh keep operating there!!
propshaft
propshaft:
over here in Australia,
Oh well, at least you’ve confirmed you are who I thought you were.
Guess you don’t know about the ice roads then. It is not the same as everyday driving in winter. They give out fines for speeding on the lakes because it is not only dangerous to you and those immediately around you, but it’s dangerous for those who come along anytime after you. When you get on the lakes, the wind will howl across them. It whips up the snow and blows it across the ice.
If you can’t see any signs of damage because of the snow, you could find yourself in deep and freezing water in a hurry. Also, the nearest person to you is at least 500 metres away. At the 15kmh speed limit it will take a while to get there. In that time, assuming you are able to get out of the vehicle and find your way to the surface, you will already be suffering. The moment you get into the open air, you will start to freeze.
I have had my hair freeze in seconds at -20. At -50 you are in real trouble. I have also had my car keys stick to my bare skin at -30.
You say he shouldn’t be allowed to operate, but he is one of only a few who will do it.
I don’t know about the confirmed who I am, thought I said I worked for a recruiting company.
I realize about the safety it was talked about all the time but I am talking about Hugh’s attitude, one driver had no heater, his crap trucks brake down and he always thinks it’s the driver’s fault but he didn’t care as they said it’s all about the money.
But in all it was a good show.
propshaft
I watched most of the episodes one Sunday afternoon recently.
I wouldn’t expect anyone to be running brand new equipment up there,but Hugh’s trucks were woefully under prepared.Seems like there is a short time in which to make alot of money,you’d think he would want to maximise his chances by at least getting his equipment sorted.
As for his drivers,at least one stuck it through most of the adversity.The other was just another bs super trucker like the cracker jacks you see propping up the video games at any truck stop in the US. 
As for Hugh being an uncaring boss,that doesn’t really fly.Truck drivers are normally a thousand miles away from home when things go wrong and have to be capable of resolving problems without their boss holding their hand.That is part of being a truck driver.I would have thought that drivers working in that kind of enviroment would have enough experience to solve their own problems.
The real pro was the guy hauling the top heavy equipment.No drama 
Longwayround:
As for Hugh being an uncaring boss,that doesn’t really fly.Truck drivers are normally a thousand miles away from home when things go wrong and have to be capable of resolving problems without their boss holding their hand.That is part of being a truck driver.I would have thought that drivers working in that kind of enviroment would have enough experience to solve their own problems.The real pro was the guy hauling the top heavy equipment.No drama
Exactly. There is little enough room for error and so there has to be an independence, but also an interdependence. You have a group and you stick together. Where we go, the idea of cellphones ends with the end of the blacktop. After that it is CB or nothing, unless you have a sat phone.
If you can’t cope, don’t do it.
Watch for the driver who gets stuck on the hill coming off the lake. He digs in so deep and I cannot see that any driver worth his salt would do that. Also, the trucks lined up on the lake would have been banned here.
When do the roads open again Rob? It’s still not cold enough for thermal undies down here. 
It’s gone colder here now. -24c this morning, and it’s - 20c now. Probably start on ice in early to mid Feb, although it depends on if it stays cold enough. Has to be this cold for several weeks before they start making the roads.
I know first hand about being miles away from anywhere being broken down, you would more than likely be eaten my flies than freeze to death over here.
We have to fix most of our trucks our self here in Australia, if were in an isolated area.
In fact it’s usually in our work agreement that we attempt to resolve the problem before calling for help.
The guy with no heater did rig up a hose to put some heat on his feet, maybe I got it wrong but it came across that Hugh didn’t care and in the end he had two trucks sitting idle because the drivers had enough, so Hugh lost the income from those two.
I don’t imagine they could get insurance so that’s why the trucks were older.
propshaft
To me personally he is like most As-hole bosses bad,old ill equipped buckets of sh-t that he expect to go for two monthes non-stop engines running no heating and of course it was the drivers fault.Ok Drew had some problems that were questionable that were his fault but driving 20 hrs straight and sometimes a lot longer maybe fatigue bad judgement but Hugh reminds me of a few a–hole bosses that i was glad to say goodbye to and there has been a lot of them in 27 yrs on the road
On the winter roads, every boss is under pressure, every boss is bad tempered when things don’t go right. They all succomb to the “blame the driver” syndrome because there is a very limited time to get the work done.
I won’t condone it, but I have seen it and can understand it. The amount of time you drive is related to the conditions of the roads. If they are in good nick then you can get pretty good speed up on the forest stretches, but on the ice itself you are set to a speed. I know that there is no way you can get the work done in a fully legal fashion. It just doesn’t work like that.
I also know that you take a fair physical beating from the roads. You get bounced around really badly, and muscles get damaged because of what you have to do. Try scrabbling around at -50 trying to dig the snow out from under your truck so you can hook chains on, then getting yanked out by another truck doing 20 kmh, and you would get the picture.
Also, there is tension like you wouldn’t believe. The first couple of runs, my hands would cramp up from gripping the wheel, and my neck was pure agony. 20 hours behind the wheel might not have been possible. But you can’t just sleep anywhere. It has to be flat and it has to be safe.
I saw trucks going North without something so vital as snowchains, so I know it goes on, but I still ask myself how much of that programme was staged.
propshaft:
his crap trucks brake down and he always thinks it’s the driver’s fault but he didn’t care as they said it’s all about the money.
The guy who came up and took that truck over from Drew completed all his trips without a single incident, same truck, same conditions, different driver - no breakdowns. Makes you wonder.
propshaft:
I don’t imagine they could get insurance so that’s why the trucks were older.
in Episode 12 - Off The Ice, Hugh talks about being paid out by the insurance company for one of his vehicles that was written off in a collision.
Thing is, I am cynical about the whole series. I haven’t done the NWT roads, but the principles have to be the same. Safety at all costs but get the job done and get home again. It soon becomes second nature to leave the handbrake off for 20 minutes to prevent freezing, and to move the truck back and forth several times to avoid freezing to the road.
It becomes second nature because it happens to you and you want to avoid it happening again.
When TJ ran into that pick up, it was obvious he was going way too fast, yet they portrayed it as an occupational hazard. They said he wasn’t to blame but he was.
When I was up there last year, the thermostat stuck open so I couldn’t get the engine up to temperature, even at high idle. It was cold even then, but on tickover going across the lakes it was bloody freezing. No point in complaining while you are there. I just wrapped my sleeping bag around my legs and got it fixed when I got back.
On my first run, I braked to avoid a huge rock sticking up and skidded right into a snowbank. I thought I was going to really struggle to get the hang of anything. After that I discovered that brakes are not something you should use but using the trailer spike and using the snowbanks as your brakes is normal practice. I saw one of the old hands pull a trailer out of a certain jacknife in a ditch using his accelerator and trailer brake at the same time. One of the best bits of driving I have ever seen…
The speed they were driving, and the way they were carrying on, makes me suspicious. I won’t say the job isn’t a little botty clenching, or that it isn’t dangerous, simply because it is.
But if you follow the instructions of those who know what they are doing and drive in a manner that is safe and try to avoid panicking, then it is a most amazing experience.
Maybe it is just cynicism…
Yeah he still said that it was underpowered and believed that there was a prob with it but he did not give a stuff but he was not on the following weeks show
]No point in complaining while you are there. I just wrapped my sleeping bag around my legs and got it fixed when I got back.
[/quote
That’s the whole point, things weren’t getting fixed when they got back to Yellowknife, I suspect that Hugh would not be authorizing the mechanic to fix the truck
I worked at a company and there was always an issue about a/c not working, the boss didn’t think it was a priority. One driver had enough went into the office on a 40 +c day and cut the power cord to the office a/c during a board meeting of area managers. Truck maintence got on the agenda of the meeting an it improved from there on.
propshaft
Of course the show was staged ,But he was still are tight assed jerk who got his own truck fixed pronto but not the other trucks and that mechanic must be his brother cos if he spoke to me like that he would have been sliding on the ice road ■■■ up talking to drew the way he did, Sure it was staged of course it was a TV show but too talk the way they did to each other was horriffic.TJ and Alex and Jay were great they had a level head all the time but hughie the mechanic were ■■■■■■■■■ that thought they were tough.But it only showed them to be straight out big mouthed jerks.As you see when he had the aqccident he had all his other trucks to use even the last guy did not stick around.No way i would work for the cheapskate money hungry bigmouthed ■■■■■■■■■■■■■.
I have to agree with sheepdog/propshaft. Hugh was a nob for all the reasons already stated. No, ive never been anywhere near the iceroads but i can recognise a good or bad boss Everyone elses fault but his… hmmmm. I`m surprised rick lasted that long with no heater for his feet 
I suppose the proof was in him having no drivers by the end of season 
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Starts tonight on Channel 5 UK so maybe at last I’ll get to see what everyone’s been going on about. 
Watched it for the first time on Ch5 last night and found it totally fasinating, judging it by the first episode Hugh and Rick just look to be “Billy Big Rigger” A-holes 
What kind of an idiot drives his trucks 3000km bobtail to put them to work even though it does pay big money 
I take it that the series was made some time ago because of the amount of old Freightshaker FLD120’s being used and “agey” Internationals too
Or maybe its because the ice roads are so hard on trucks you just use a “scrapper”
Maybe its just me but did you guy’s not think that most of the drivers looked like “death warmed up” even before they started on the ice roads