Jeep'n OOPS!

This page is to share one of our Jeep adventures. 
This one a definite OOPS!

This is our new 2017 Jeep JK we bought.
 

It had to be red since we are both firefighters (Nancy is the chief and Alan is a Captain in the Route 504 VFD).
We were intending to use it for our personal fire response vehicle.
We equipped it with lights and a siren.
Loaded our turnout gear, a 2.5 gallon water extinguisher, a 25 pound dry powder extinguisher, and some other equipment in it and we were ready for the first call.

Tones dropped for a structure fire about 12 miles from our house in another fire department's response area.
A structure fire means it is an automatic mutual aid and all the departments in the county should respond.

This is what happened as we arrived on the fire scene.
Because other firefighters had to go to their fire departments to get their trucks we were the first firefighters on scene.
The fire was in a trailer up a hill on the right side of the road.
There was a wide flat grass area with low brush that had been mowed off on the left.
Alan pulled off there and discovered that what appeared to be brush mowed flat concealed a gully about 5 feet deep.
So at that moment we had two tires on the pavement and the other two in the air.
This picture shows the result.


Neither of us were hurt but I can tell you that it is very disorienting to be upside down hanging from your seatbelt.
Left is no longer left and right is no longer right.
We unbuckled and fell to the ceiling. 
There were lots of bystanders who had been watching the fire and now had some other excitement to see.
They came rushing over but we didn't need their help once we decided that whichever door was closest still led to the outside.
Someone had called 911 and dispatch called for an EMS response for two gray haired old people in a red Jeep that had rolled over.
We heard that on our radios and so did every emergency responder in the county as well half the county that have scanners to keep track of what is going on around here..
Once we were out Alan dragged out his gear bag and put on his turnout gear to be ready to fight the fire when the first firetruck arrived.
Nancy got her safety vest and flag to control traffic and chase lookie-loos out of the way so that the firetrucks could get through.
In a minute or two the first truck with one firefighter arrived and went up the driveway toward the house.
Alan ran up the hill, grabbed a hose and pulled it to the door while the other firefighter got the pump going.
Each truck carries about 1000 gallons of water so we can fight a fire without other support for a few minutes.
There was smoke coming from under the eves but no flame visible there or through the windows.
When Alan opened the door the fire grew dramatically and so he couldn't make entry and just fought it through the door.
Within a few minutes (it is hard to keep track of time) other firefighters started to arrive and he gladly relinquished the nozzle to one of them and went to sit down.

Remember, that there were lots of people who had heard about the accident.
Two of them were friends from our search and rescue group.
They immediately said to each other "That's Alan and Nancy!" and came to see if we were OK.
He is a flight paramedic, off duty that day, and saw Alan sitting trying to cool off so he told the EMS crew to check him out.
By the time they climbed the hill and got electrodes on Alan his pulse was "only" 148.
Not sure what it was when he was managing the hose line by himself.
When he got cooled down and there were others on scene to manage traffic we went to survey the Jeep's condition.

 

I want to report some of the Jeep's features that we tried out.
The roll cage is very effective but traction in the inverted mode isn't good at all.
The sheriff had called for a tow truck and I heard him say to them "You've never seen a wreck like this, it's shiny on the bottom!"
The tow truck didn't have any problem getting it right side up and loaded onto their rollback.


Here Alan is checking on just how he got into this mess.


The passenger side looks like nothing had happened except for the little bend in the fender flare.

Damage was limited to the fender flares, 2 windows, a 5 inch hole punched in the hardtop by a stump, and relatively minor dents on driver side doors and body panels.
Nothing that a good body man would have any problem smoothing out.
However it was new and the insurance company had no problem authorizing replacement of all the damaged parts.
We said that was fine with us but we didn't realize that would mean we would have to wait more than 7 weeks for all of them to arrive.

Meanwhile we were planning on a trip to our first Jeep get together, The Great Smoky Mountain Jeep Invasion in Pigeon Forge Tennessee.
Now we were temporally Jeepless but we went anyway with some of the pictures above and this sign in the window of our Honda.
That certainly attracted a lot more attention than a nearly stock Jeep would have


More Jeeping adventures
Jeep invasion
Coddiwomple overland

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