EVELETH -- Brenda Fossell has been driving big trucks more than half her life, and she's only ever been really scared of one thing -- a steering tire blowout.
In the predawn hours Friday, Fossell's worst on-the-road nightmare finally came true. After arising at 2:30 a.m. to pile a load of balsam logs on the Birchem Logging trailer destined for a mill near St. Cloud, Minn., Fossell bundled her 4-year-old son McKane into the cab and headed out of Aurora.
She was just south of Eveleth on Highway 53, about 30 miles into the trip, when the steering wheel started to shimmy.
"I felt the front of the truck go down, and the pup trailer started to fishtail on me," Fossell said. The front right tire had blown, sending the cab and two loaded trailers lurching across the road. The second trailer, attached to the first by a hitch, is called the "pup."
When one of the middle or rear tires on a trailer blows, truck drivers often hear them pop or feel a little bump, nothing more. But when a steering tire goes, there's suddenly no way to control the vehicle, "and you have 10 or 12 thousand pounds of weight behind you," said Jerry Birchem, owner of Birchem Logging in Gilbert.
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Fossell had been driving in the right-hand lane, and the rig was pulling her toward the median. If any of the tires had slipped onto the soft, rain-soaked shoulder, "it would have sucked her in," Birchem said, and Fossell's truck would have overturned or plowed into oncoming traffic.
But Fossell kept her head and fought the wheel. Though the pup trailer had broken its hitch, overturned behind her and dumped its load of logs into the ditch, she brought the truck safely to a stop on the shoulder of the road. She was unhurt -- and McKane was still asleep beside her.
As she stepped out of the cab to survey the wreckage of spilled logs and damaged trailer, "I was still wound tight," Fossell said. Her first call was to 911, her second was to Birchem. Traffic on Highway 53 was limited to one lane for several hours on Friday as the logs were cleared away.
Fossell, 37, has been driving trucks for more than 20 years, and has been with Birchem Logging for eight years.
"I like the sense of independence, I like working outdoors," Fossell said. And she likes the fact that her children can be with her, just as she clamored to ride with her truck-driving father when she was young. Fossell has driven dumptrucks, delivered fertilizer, hauled blacktop and sugar beets -- almost everything except long-haul trucking, she said. She wants to be home every night.
And, until Friday, she had never had a serious accident, though she had been run off the road once. Birchem credited Fossell for her quick reaction and cool demeanor.
"She's pretty rare," said one of Fossell's co-workers who kept her and McKane company until a replacement truck arrived. No other passers-by had stopped to see whether she needed any help, something Fossell found surprising.
And despite all that had transpired, as Friday morning stretched towards noon, Fossell was eager for the pick-up-sticks pile of logs to be pulled out of the ditch and loaded on to a new trailer. She didn't start off again until about 1:30 p.m.
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There was still a load of logs that needed delivering, after all, and she and McKane intended to get it done.
JANNA GOERDT covers the communities surrounding Duluth. She can be reached weekdays at (218) 279-5527 or by e-mail at jgoerdt@duluthnews.com .
