Continuing my obsession with All Things Bitterly Cold, I found a new show the other month that allows me to live vicariously through others without all those pesky details such as lack of sleep and extremely cold temperatures and potential frostbite and the always annoying Chance Of Death.  OK, so I do currently experience Lack of Sleep since we have a two-month-old in the house, but other than that I’d say my job is relatively tame assuming you don’t factor in the Potential Death On The Interstate variable.

So, in addition to Discovery Channel’s Deadliest Catch, I now am hooked on the History Channel’s Ice Road Truckers.  These guys drive their rigs, sometimes with 100,000 pounds of equipment, from Yellowknife (in the Northwest Territories) to several diamond mines just south of the Arctic Circle.  This 300 mile trip goes over several frozen lakes and in this last winter they delivered 10,000+ truckloads of material to the mines.

These guys have nerves of steel since every time their truck runs on the ice, the ice sheet is cracking under the weight and you can hear that sound.  Speed limits are strictly enforced due to the fact that when a truck is on the ice, a mini-wave is created from the pressure of the ice being pushed downward.  If that wave gets too large, it will crack open the ice ahead of the truck and there is a really good potential of the truck going right into that fissure in the ice.  In addition, these waves also happen when two trucks are going the opposite way and the two waves meet and create havoc.  If a driver is caught speeding, he is put on a 5-day suspension.  This is a huge hit in the pocket since the “window” of good weather to drive on these lakes is about 60 days and you're paid for each load you deliver.  After your second infraction, you are expelled from driving.

On top of the danger of having your rig plunge to the bottom of a lake, the temperatures in the evening can get to 50-60 below zero.  Whiteouts are a round-the-clock hazard too which can become deadly if you veer off the prepared path on these lakes.  The truckers are trained for survival mode if their truck breaks down or if they plunge through the ice.  Deaths do occur (although not the last winter season) which is why any little infraction is dealt with severely.  They also have to have crews ready for a quick extraction of any trucks whose loads present a potential environmental nightmare, such as a tanker truck or a truck loaded with ammonium nitrate (used for explosives to aid in diamond mining).

While it’s hard for the environmentalist in me to justify the ecological impact these mines present (and any resulting mishaps occur with the transportation of their materials), I still tip my cap to the drivers who brave these insane conditions.  Money is the main reason these guys do it although I’m sure you have to have a sense of pioneering adventure to even want to attempt working in such harsh conditions.