Fatal Towing Accident

Brutal... There was so much potential for things to wrong there... I wonder if the leverage from the dropped ball made the difference there.. I guess it did. These accidents are tragedies that change everything in an instant.. We had one close to home last week. I'll try to get that written up soon. Still in a bit of shock over it.
 
A tragic incident.
There was a TreeBuzz thread on tow hooks/ towing some years ago now if it’s still in the X files somewhere.
In one of the E&P majors I worked for we had multiple field operator fatalities in separate towing incidents during heavy snowfalls. The straps broke and sent the tow hook right thru the headache racks on the operators pickups. The company banned metal tow hooks on tow straps. Nowadays there’s also tow strap materials that don’t stretch and so don’t store so much potential energy in case of failure (e.g. spectra I suppose?).
Stay safe out there - not only at work but talk about this at home too, particularly with young drivers in the family.
 
Reach said:
Yes, there sure is. Add in my guess that the guy pulling shocked the sling because the truck was stuck so deep, and that snapped off the receiver real nice and easy!
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Yep, maybe wouldn't have happened if they were using a dynamic recovery rope instead of a static towing strap, but the torque on that drop-hitch was a huge factor.
 
Tragic. A good reminder to add some sort of dampening (like what Daniel suggested) any time you're towing or pulling hard. In this case it looks like it would have required more than a hank of rope if the windshield and steering wheel didn't stop it. I don't think metal tow hooks, if they're rated high, would be the weak point. It's what they're attached to that's more important. The tow hook just becomes the dangerous projectile. If the rope or tow strap breaks, it would just be fabric that goes flying--not a big chunk of metal. Just my armchair two cents worth.

Very sad situation. My condolences to anyone involved.
 
Daniel said:
YOu can tend to deflect that rebounding line downward by hanging a weight on the line... I'll drape a wound-up rope over the pull line when pulling with the skid loader if there is any thought that the line will break.
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Couple months ago I had a line pulled to 2000 lb (with load cell on it) as an experiment in cutting lines under load. I draped about 100 ft chunk of half inch stable braid across it to deflect the spring back forces. Well that rope when I cut it, ripped out of there just like the old tablecloth under the dishes trick. Weight on the line didn't appear to help one bit. More testing is necessary obviously, but that's not the result I was imagining......
 
The full article is here.

@Reach You were right. They took a "running start" to try and yank the truck out of the mud.

the pair of wheelers decided a running start was in order to break the truck free. The added stress brought on by this running start proved to be too much for the drop hitch intended for towing, shearing it off the truck in the process.

The energy still built up within the static strap sent that large chunk of metal flying back towards the Woods' vehicle, where it would enter the windshield on the driver’s side. The hitch would smash through with such force that it broke the top half of the steering wheel before coming in contact with Ryan. The father of three died instantly according to his wife, with his three children behind him in the back seats, unfortunately bearing witness to the whole ordeal.
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