TR Footnotes FN_0613 : Page 1

TOWING & RECOVERY The Independent Voice of the Towing Industry June 2013 FOOTN TES ® w y o no hl nt inf & 13 mo o ges 11 p a re See P Our New LOOk we’ve gone lighter and brighter to bring you a more modern, classy-looking version of your towing industry trade journal! Inside we’re still the Footnotes you’ve always looked forward to seeing on your desk every month. Proudly Announces t&r footnotes Keeping Industry Pros On Their Tows www.trfootnotes.com we just look and feel better now! And that’s all the better (& brighter) for our many, many loyal readers, advertisers, and buyers and sellers of tow trucks, tow gear, and services. And consider advertising with us. Footnotes’ new look will be attracting even more lookers! It’s a wrap! in the towing sPotLight In This Issue: Business Technology In July: Fire & Rescue advertise now! Call david Abraham 877-219-7734, ext 1 Volume 24, Number 2 x $3.95 ©2013 Causey enterprises, LLC. All rights reserved. Over The edge Dangling cab, mangled trailer, no problem BY RITa FRaNkENBERRY When the driver of a 40-foot tractor trailer lost control of her vehicle ear-lier this month, the truck’s cab went over the side of the Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-tunnel between Ports-mouth and Newport News in Virginia. it was dangling — with the driver still inside — a few feet over the water be-low. Fortunately for her, two of the cab’s wheels snagged a pole, which prevented it from tumbling into the James river. “the only thing holding the cab on was one stabilizer bar,” said John Pel-frey, co-owner of tidewater express in Newport News. “it was just dangling basically and was ripped to shreds.” Pelfrey and his father, Mike Pelfrey, were both on the scene within one min-ute of the accident. tidewater express has a contract with the Virginia depart-ment of transportation to help clear disabled vehicles and minor fender-benders from the long bridge-tunnel. they keep four wreckers — two on each side of the bridge — and two drivers on call 24 hours a day to help clear the smaller breakdowns. Although this dramatic accident was outside the parameters of that contract, tidewater express was asked to help since they already had their wreckers on the scene. The Only Option While members of the Newport News Fire department rescued the driver from the cab — hoisting her out with a harness and pulling her back up to the bridge — John Pelfrey and his dad began brainstorming ideas to get the truck’s cab back onto the bridge and the wreckage hauled away. “We had an hour while they res-cued the driver,” said John Pelfrey. the strategy the father-and-son duo came up with was to use 50 feet of 3/4-inch See Over The edge, page 3 P .O. Box 64397 Virginia Beach, VA 23467 Towing & Recovery Footnotes ® PrSt Std u.S. POStAge PAid peoria, il permit no. 315

OVER THE EDGE

Rita Frankenberry

When the driver of a 40-foot tractor trailer lost control of her vehicle earlier this month, the truck’s cab went over the side of the Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-tunnel between Portsmouth and Newport News in Virginia. it was dangling — with the driver still inside — a few feet over the water below. Fortunately for her, two of the cab’s wheels snagged a pole, which prevented it from tumbling into the James river. “The only thing holding the cab on was one stabilizer bar,” said John Pelfrey, co-owner of tidewater express in Newport News. “it was just dangling basically and was ripped to shreds.” Pelfrey and his father, Mike Pelfrey, were both on the scene within one minute of the accident. tidewater express has a contract with the Virginia department of transportation to help clear disabled vehicles and minor fenderbenders from the long bridge-tunnel. They keep four wreckers — two on each side of the bridge — and two drivers on call 24 hours a day to help clear the smaller breakdowns. Although this dramatic accident was outside the parameters of that contract, tidewater express was asked to help since they already had their wreckers on the scene. The Only Option While members of the Newport News Fire department rescued the driver from the cab — hoisting her out with a harness and pulling her back up to the bridge — John Pelfrey and his dad began brainstorming ideas to get the truck’s cab back onto the bridge and the wreckage hauled away. “We had an hour while they rescued the driver,” said John Pelfrey. the strategy the father-and-son duo came up with was to use 50 feet of 3/4-inch chain to rig the cab and winch it up using a VdOt crane at the accident scene. “We didn’t want to re-chain it multiple times,” John Pelfrey said. “really, there wasn’t another option.” The only other option they briefly considered involved coming below the wreckage in a boat and trying to rig it from there. While the Pelfreys ultimately used the VdOt crane to lift the cab back onto the roadway, Mike noted that the two 50-ton wreckers they had at the scene could have done the job as well. Straps & Chains John Pelfrey and a crane rigger were lowered in a basket to the tractor cab by the crane operator. Pelfrey then got busy using the chains to secure the wrecked cab to be brought back onto the bridge. “We used the straps to rig the cab, but used heavy chains on the frame and the engine,” John Pelfrey said. “it was strenuous.” He added: “the basket was swinging a little bit, but it was the best way to get down there.” In addition to the Pelfreys, there were teams of other rescue workers on the scene that April morning of the accident. Besides VdOt’s incident management team, the Virginia Port Authority was on hand, the Virginia State Police, both the Newport News and Suffolk Fire departments, and the united States Coast guard. “All of these folks were a big help to us,” Mike Pelfrey said. The Pelfreys, however, had command of the accident scene as soon as the driver was rescued from the cab. despite their contract limitations, they were not only placed in charge of recovering the cab from the side of the bridge, but also given the larger task of separating the cab from the frame, loading that onto a trailer, loading the trailer the driver was hauling, and having it all hauled away. “in this case, once VdOt secured the scene and the traffic, they turned it over to us to clear the roadway as quickly as possible,” Mike Pelfrey said. Fast Work When the driver, Almira ribic, smashed into the side of the bridge, her truck also spilled 150 gallons of fuel onto the bridge. A hazmat team cleaned up the spill while the Pelfreys worked to get the cab back up onto the bridge. Both north and southbound traffic was stopped for hours, including the need for VdOt to inspect the bridge before opening it up again. In all, the Pelfreys had the accident cleared up in four hours, nothing short of a miracle, said tracy Mason, a traffic-control supervisor with VdOt at the Monitor-Merrimac bridgetunnel, who was also at the accident scene that day. After seeing the wreck, she said she wondered how the Pelfreys were going to get the cab back onto the bridge. “It was pretty impressive how they did it,” she said. “i was thinking, ‘is this going to fall? is it going to hold? What are they going to do?’” But in the end, she said, “they did great. i thought the scene got cleared up pretty fast.” The Pelfreys were also happy with their performance that day. “i feel like we cleared the roadway in a reasonable amount of time,” said Mike Pelfrey. “there wasn’t a pinched finger. Nobody — with all these people — nobody got hurt. At the end of the day, it was a great day.” BOOMING BUSINESS When Mike Pelfrey opened his auto repair shop in Hampton, VA, 25 years ago, he had no idea how tidewater express inc. would expand. According to Pelfrey, they’ve done well over time, but since last year, business has literally boomed! tidewater express added two more shops — giving them five locations throughout Hampton, Chesapeake, Newport News and Virginia Beach — and a business that now includes much more than just auto repair. Last year, Pelfrey and his son John Pelfrey, vice president of the company, landed two contracts to maintain the area’s busiest tunnels: the Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge tunnel, which handles about 50,000 cars each day, and the Hampton roads Bridge-tunnel, which carries about three million cars each month. they were awarded the Virginia department of transportation (VdOt) contracts in January after a lengthy process. “these are critical arteries so there are lots of background checks,” Pelfrey said. “that’s a slow process.” These two VDOt contracts are in addition to two other VDOt contracts the Pelfreys were awarded last July. the Pelfreys also maintain the Midtown tunnel and the downtown tunnel, both of which link the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth. this is why Mike Pelfrey said, “Last year, we exploded!” the company is now responsible for four tunnels and their bridges. “We maintain one man and two pieces of equipment at each end of each tunnel,” added Pelfrey. Many Services In addition to the VdOt contracts and towing agreements with other local municipalities, the Pelfreys have also slowly added a host of other divisions to help bulk up their bottom line. in addition to auto repair, their company also does truck repair; offers tire and roadside service; operates a full-service body shop; and runs a wrecker service. Tidewater express also has become the area’s licensed commercial goodyear tire distributor. in december, after goodyear lost its commercial truck tire distributor for the Hampton roads area, the Pelfreys decided to go after that business as well. It was a no-brainer, Mike Pelfrey said, adding that the decision didn’t require them to buy any new equipment, just put in the tire inventory and do some training to sell the tires. “So we’re marketing that,” he said, adding that over the past two decades, the business has changed drastically from the auto repair business he started in 1988. Pushing To 100 “It changed from us managing people to hiring managers to manage people,” Pelfrey said. And there’s plenty of staff to manage. Currently the total number of employees hovers around 88, but Pelfrey expects to push this total to around 100 before the year ends. Adding all the new divisions and shops, he added, has also meant that he’s a lot busier these days. But it has also meant that when work for one division slows down, there are usually one or two other divisions that are profitable at that time to offset expenses. “The margins on everything we do in the trucking business are very thin,” Pelfrey said. “So you either get to a very small operation, or you need to get large enough. Our plan was to get it big enough that even if all the divisions don’t make money, some of them do.” When interviewed in late April, Pelfrey noted that spring is the most profitable time of the year: “We’re just starting to pick up all across the board.”

Publication List
Using a screen reader? Click Here