Transporting a Mega Mining Truck Over Melting Roads

In 40-plus degree heat, Cameron is struggling for grip on a melting road. It's 43 degrees, so the bitumen's probably 60 or something. Being that hot a day, it's starting to rip the bitumen up. I'll have to come back a bit, mate. His only option is to drop back and try again. But with his tyres now covered in wet tar and the road a mess, this attempt will be even harder. He needs a miracle. Wider than four family cars and weighing more than a house, this $3 million truck was never built for the open road. We don't want to get stuck, because if we get stuck, we'll never get out. Heavy haulage expert Cameron Smith is checking and rechecking his gear. All the tyres look like they should make it. The 40-year-old has been hauling oversized loads for 15 years. Pretty exciting job. That's what we do every day. The first challenge is to load the mega truck onto the back of Cameron's own truck. So hopefully we can get into the mine, get a load fairly quick and beat the heat. The Lee Creek coal mine shut down three months ago. We'll head in and hopefully it all goes smoothly. To support the mammoth load, he needs to widen his trailer to 4.5 metres, nearly as far as it will go. Now to reverse the dump truck on. Turn it around so we can bag it on. With thousands of kilometres of brutal road ahead, the load needs to be perfectly balanced. It's a slow process. Just try and get it right the first time. I'll be here all day if I don't line it up right. But going slow isn't an option. Let's have a look. This truck needs to be in Perth in exactly six days, on a Sunday. That's the only day Cameron can get this monster through the city. Miss that deadline and he'll be grounded for a week, costing his company thousands of dollars. We've just got to move the truck over a little bit this way, about three inches. We'll take him off again and try again. Just try and get the back of the dump truck over, probably two inches. We've just about got it this time, so go back about another metre and we'll have a look. That will do. All in all, a good result, I think. With a series of steep hills on the route ahead, securing the load well is essential. All that's left is to remove the two massive steer tyres, at 21 tonnes. Each tyre weighs more than two elephants. Cameron's finally loaded. You're right to go, Les. Yeah, mate, yeah. Helping him on the long haul west, Les Russell in the push truck. At the moment, we're probably 60% of maximum power. As you can appreciate, in the hills, it'll work a bit harder. Les's truck provides extra traction and horsepower, essential with a rig that is 44 metres long and weighs close to 200 tonnes. To safely deliver this behemoth, cooperation between the two drivers is crucial. It's all a matter of having confidence in the boat up in front. He's in control of the whole lot. If I decided I wanted to stop, I couldn't stop. I've got to rely on Cameron up in front. And now, their first test. Floodway down here. It's got a little bit of a flow going through it. We're over the road up here. Heavy overnight rain has left a trail of destruction. Rubbish all over the road. Yeah, right on, mate. You'll have to take it easy coming through this one. Looks like there's a fair bit of water on the road and rubble as well. There's no turning this beast around. The only way through is forward. Tree debris and stuff all over the road, so you just take it easy. You don't know what you're sort of going to run over. The slightest damage to this load could be a very expensive exercise. The dump truck on the back is worth $3 million and Cameron's trailer, another 1.1 mil. Yeah, you sort of might bend a rim or do a tyre or something like that. It's the last thing we need. Through. But their wet weather troubles are far from finished. It looks like it might start the rain. It's, um... I don't know, it's a bit threatening. A couple of drops on the windscreen. It's not a good sign by the look of it. Just climbing this hill, I'm just a little bit worried about the wet weather and breaking traction. The last thing I want is to break traction halfway up this hill. If Cameron's wheels start spinning, he'll quickly grind to a halt. With the amount of weight behind him, getting moving again would be nearly impossible. I don't think we'd take off in the wet. We'd have to roll back down and transfer some weight further forward and try again. The dump truck convoy is now approaching the town of Port Augusta. At 8 metres wide and over 6 metres high, driving through town isn't an option. Make our way up to the dirt. Hopefully the dirt's all dried out. A 30-kilometre dirt road bypass is their only way forward. Yeah, if we got bogged, it'd be a bit of a nightmare, really. You know, it took a couple of days to dry out. You'd have to sit that out and wait and then try and pull yourself out with a grater. But now, another hill. It may not be wet, but getting traction on this climb could still be a problem. It does look like it's got loose gravel all over it, mate. Can you give us any more, mate? Enough momentum to help me out a bit, maybe. Fingers crossed. That'll make me up the top. After slow going, Cameron's looking to make up time. He needs to be in Perth in five days' time for a scheduled road closure to get his giant load into the city. If we don't catch it up, we won't make the Sunday curfew and then we have to wait till the following Sunday. But now, another dirt bypass is approaching and news from the pilot isn't good. We might have to pull you up on that little pad on the left-hand... There's a dirt road that we've got to go on just up here and the councillor said it's too wet for us to cross at this stage. Yeah, this could cause us some trouble. We're just going to jump in the pilot car and we're going to have a look for ourselves and see how wet this is. This is normally where it gets soft here, just in this little bit of a dip here is normally where it salts off. If we get a soft spot and we can't get through, we will get bogged, but they just asked to come and have a look. We've come and had a look and we think we can get through it, so as long as there's no other soft spots further up the track... A little bit soft there, Les. Back on the safety of the bitumen, but now an approaching state border. It's a big inspection point for vehicles driving west and the end of the line for Cameron's push truck. It's only through South Australia that we need the second truck hooked on. I'm taught I'm on my own then. The fate of this journey now rests squarely on Cameron. I'm just going to disconnect Les and Les can be on his way back home. His first test, passing this inspection. Got to give them a bit of paper saying that I've got no fruit and veg and no dirt and all that's on the machine. They'll have a quick look and they should be all happy. There you go. Good thanks. All clear in the food department. But after the dirt bypasses, the truck is carrying a thick coat of dust. It's Lee Creek coal mine. Yep. She's going to have a look at it and see what she reckons. She's just called over someone else to have another look at it so they must be concerned at something. The inspection isn't going as he hoped. We brushed a couple of trees earlier. They're not happy. They send you to a quarantine checkpoint to get the machine washed which can take a day and a half or so. Yep. It's a nervous wait. See what she reckons. We're all good to go. She's happy with that. We're on our way. 1,400 kilometres still stand between Cameron and his destination. If we don't get in by Sunday, it means we have to wait a full week until the following Sunday to go back in. But with a load one metre wider than the entire road, he can't push too hard. We're just coming up to Majura Pass which is a climb up out of the basin. Up ahead, a steep hill to pull him back even more. This is where it becomes a bit trickier. With 130 tonnes to drag single-handedly... We'll just crawl up the hill. You're probably at about 5 to 10 k's an hour. ..it's a long, slow climb. We're good to the top of the pass. ..lose traction or miss a gear... We're in second gear there, about 10 k's an hour. ..and it would be near impossible to get moving again. If something went wrong, it'd be a disaster, I think. Over the summit, Cameron's keen to see how his 80-wheel trailer is holding up. Let's get out and check all the tyres. Hopefully everything's good and we can just keep rolling. Can't afford to really lose too much time. That's not a good sound. Oh, I'm pressured. Better change that so we can keep going. Better luck we don't lose too much daylight. It might mean we can't make the parking bay we need to make. The tyre change goes smoothly, but even an hour has taken a toll. We pulled up probably 150 k's shorter where we needed to be. Lose that sort of time each day could make it hard for us to get in on that Sunday. Cameron's got 1,200 kilometres to cover in just 48 hours. A smooth run today is critical. Good to go, Ken. 8-metre oversize load. Westbound. Oh, no, we're all out. It's the start of the dirt road. Let's see what we're in for. It's a 150-kilometre bypass. With it being dirt, it sort of adds a fair bit more time. And making things harder, a series of challenging climbs. We've come up a fairly steep jump up. Hopefully we get up. With 130 tonnes pulling him backwards, Cameron's biggest worry is losing traction. I hope that this one hasn't got loose gravel or corrugation, otherwise we might not get up. If you're going to break traction, you're going to break it at the worst possible point, which would be right on the peak. Try and keep the revs up. Bit of corrugation here, which could be a little bit of a drama. Probably only halfway up. Starting to slip. Fingers crossed we make it. Uh-oh. He's losing speed. It's not looking good. He's losing grip. Hopefully we'll stand. I'll just have to come back. Bit of a shame, we're about three-quarters of the way up there. His drive tyres have lost traction on the loose gravel. He can't go any further forward. Yeah, unfortunately we have to roll back down. The plan is to get another run-up. But reversing an eight-metre wide load over hundreds of metres is a tricky manoeuvre. I can't sort of see, so I'm relying on someone else. Try and keep us in the middle of the road there, mate. Yeah, we'll just have to see how we go here. To stand a chance this time, Cameron needs to move the load forward. So I'll just lower this suspension down. I'll just transfer some weight. More weight over his truck's drive tyres should mean more traction. All right, we'll try that. Fingers crossed this time. Probably about 30 metres off where I got stuck, so this is a crucial part. Would have earned a beer for the day if we get through this. Cameron is now moving away from the outback and into farmland. With every passing kilometre, the trees are getting bigger, creating a bigger hazard for his load. Just coming up to some overhead trees, so hopefully we don't hit them. With a $3 million price tag, this is one load you don't want to damage. I've got to watch the fire suppression system on the right-hand side up the top there because if we break one of them hoses off, we'll have foam and stuff going everywhere. It's probably about a foot diameter tree branch there that will break things. Yeah, I'll just crawl up to it, mate. Just missed it. I wouldn't have liked to have my finger in there. Cameron's deadline is now within his grasp. But as he gets closer to Perth, the temperature outside is soaring. It's 43 degrees, so the bitumen's probably 60 or something. And now, one of the steepest hills of his run. Just broken traction on the bitumen. Being that odd a day, it's starting to rip the bitumen up. The road is melting. His only option is to drop back and try again. But with his tyres now covered in wet tar and the road a mess, this attempt will be even harder. He needs a miracle, or at least a good Samaritan. A fellow trucker offers him another set of wheels to help pull him up. Got a bloke stopping to give us a hand. Yeah, we're nearly at the top now, mate. Thanks very much, mate. No worries, mate. Never underestimate a freightliner. With one eye on the sizzling bitumen... Yeah, we'll be all right up this hill. ..Cameron's closing in on Perth and his deadline. Tomorrow is Sunday, the only day of the week he's allowed to enter the city. But the heat isn't done with him yet. They put that curfew on at 10.30 this morning. Yep. After weeks of sweltering temperatures, bushfires are a constant threat. Bad news there that the power blokes now have just told me that the total fire ban's kicked in for this region. The fire ban prevents any activities that could set off a bushfire, including lifting power lines. We can't deliver the machine. We're only 95km out. With hundreds of low wires in his path, Cameron's stranded until the fire ban is lifted. It's sort of devastating for me to drag the machine from one side of the country to the other and we can't deliver the machine. We have to wait till next Sunday to travel in Perth. Cameron's marooned here for at least another week. We've been parked in this beautiful parking bay here since last Saturday. Most of the week's been 44. We've had temperatures up at 46 degrees. Hopefully tomorrow's not another total fire ban, otherwise we're stuck here for another week. So I don't know whether I can handle that. Next morning. Good news. The ban has been lifted. This morning's looking all right weather-wise. We're good to get going. If the temperature climbs too high, the ban could be put back in place. He needs to make this delivery fast. On the road. We've just got a couple of wires down here that we've got to lift. There we go. I'll just go over to the right. You've cleared that one. I've just got to do the 6km's now down to the power line. We've got to do 10km's now over bridges. Everything adds up to a long day. And now the reason for the Sunday deadline. Closing down the Tonkin Highway, one of Perth's biggest arteries. This time of the day, the Tonkin Highway's fairly busy with traffic. You guys can move up here if you want. Pilots have just given me the word that they've got it blocked, so... Major highway being 100km, you don't want any accidents. Yeah, wheels on, gas up the struts and should be able to roll her off. After two weeks and 2,600 hard kilometres, these are the last 30 metres of a truly mammoth job. Cameron's mission is complete. Finally unloaded the machine and all worked out all right. And then go to the next job. Hopefully there's no total firemen.