Recap and update on the truck’s frame failure that ended our Alaska trip

Back in June I posted a couple of real-time updates about how our truck’s front frame broke after a fuel stop, leaving the truck sitting at a service road intersection, with our coach dragging the bumper and tow base plate. This blog is usually a couple of months behind real-time, and now the posts have caught up with that and are back home after that incident. So this seems a good opportunity to recap those adventures, and give an update.

We were in Fort St John, British Columbia, Canada at the time of the failure, on our way to Alaska. A major trip, with lots of campground reservations, excursion bookings, and activities, that we had been planning and looking forward to for some time.

Here’s a news article from Wyoming’s Cowboy State Daily newspaper. Pretty well written and accurate, other than the typical assumption that I was driving, when Jenn is the driver, which wouldn’t have made any difference with the issue.

Here’s an interactive map of our route from our home base near Shelton, Washington to where the truck separated in Fort St John, with our overnight stops marked:

And our route back home:

To recap, we were about a thousand miles into our journey, just 46 miles into the Alaska Highway (aka Alcan) after Dawson Creek. We were leaving a fuel stop in Fort St John, when the front frame of our truck failed, and the tow base plate broke off. It had probably been weakening for some time, though we hadn’t noticed any issue… then a tight turn at the fuel stop followed by a rough service road were the last straws.

Fortunately the truck was stopped at an intersection when it failed; it could have been much worse if it failed in motion. Though a failure when starting from a stop was more likely, since that’s a more sudden force than just a continual pull. Luckily we caught it within about a minute of it happening. Actually a passer-by alerted us: they were attracting our attention, and we were wondering what they were trying to alert us to, when we looked at the rear-view camera, and saw that the truck was missing. We don’t stare at the camera all the time, since it just showed the truck, and when indicating while merging onto a highway it only shows the side view; the side mirrors are more useful for that. She was the one who recorded the video of our coach dragging the bumper (see below).

As soon as we noticed, we pulled off on the side of the road. A digger operator who had been working near the incident and had seen it pulled up in front of us in his pickup, and helped us disconnect the tow bar and loaded the bumper in the back of his truck. We collected it from him later. He was super helpful; everyone we encountered during this issue were helpful and sympathetic, which was much appreciated.

After removing the tow bar, we turned our coach around and headed back to the site of the incident, parking the coach at a nearby Kal Tire facility. Then we moved the truck (which was still drivable). We took it to a nearby Chevy dealer, but it was beyond their ability to help. They referred us to a nearby body shop, who didn’t have any availability, but looked at it and wasn’t sure it could be fixed, but kindly said they’d do some research. We then headed to a nearby RV park to await more information from the body shop.

After sleeping on it, we decided to head home. We considered driving the truck separately to Alaska, or storing it in Fort St John and renting a car in Alaska, but either would impact the enjoyment of our trip. The big issue was that even if the truck frame could have been repaired, the tow base plate would be an extra complication. We decided we’d rather come back again in a year or two and do it right.

Here’s a video from someone who saw us dragging the bumper (and then flagged us down). The video went viral, with millions of views in various Facebook groups, TikTok, etc. Reading the comments provides an interesting sample of humanity; some sympathetic people, but a lot more trolls showing a lack of empathy for a significant event, or making irrelevant comments or incorrect assumptions (it’s not a Jeep, we didn’t drag it lots of miles, we’re not Boomers or rich, etc etc). Disappointing, but not surprising.

Your browser does not support the video tag.

Unfortunately I didn’t take photos of the incident itself, so I was glad to find that video. I did take some photos when we got to the Chevy dealer:

The bumper and other parts loaded into the back of our truck:

The tow bar was mostly intact, but its electrical cable was shredded from being dragged on the road:

I zip-tied the loose wires etc, and we drove separately home over the next few days, as shown in the recent posts:

After driving our motorhome and truck separately for about 950 miles (1,529 km), we made it home safely.

Here are some photos of the broken components laid out on the ground at home:

Truck, front frame, tow base plate, bumper, tow bar; all damaged:

We dropped off our truck at a local body shop, so they could investigate further, and get it inspected by the insurance adjuster. A few days later, the insurance company told us that they decided to do a total write-off of the truck.

So this concludes the story of our truck’s incident, and the end of our ownership of this truck. It was a great vehicle, very reliable, well traveled all over the country, though with low miles for a 10-year-old truck (being towed doesn’t count on the odometer). A most unfortunate result, that had a big impact on our plans. Stay tuned for what comes next!

It was a disappointing end to our Alaska trip, but we aren’t entirely missing out on Alaska this year: we also have an Alaska cruise coming up in September (that we booked several months ago), so that helps us feel this was the right choice for us. We’ll be back to see the rest of Alaska in the next year or two, and would like to explore more of Canada too.