Truck driver Rod Cardinal was driving from Alberta to the Gibraltar Mine near Williams Lake, B.C., Canada, delivering 40 metric tons of ammonium nitrate, a chemical compound used in about 80% of explosives in North America.
During his trip on Nov. 6th, he noticed smoke seeping through the carpet of his cab.
Cardinal knew he had a fire so he immediately pulled over from the Trans-Canada Highway and used 2 of his fire extinguishers. The extinguishers did nothing. He described what he did next to KTW reporters.
“That’s when I stopped, hopped out, dropped the trailer, pulled the tractor as far as I could.”
He managed to prevent an explosion as he unhooked the trailer from the burning cab and drove it away 50 feet with it still on fire.
Kamloops fire rescue could not respond because the event took place outside their jurisdiction. Police did manage an evacuation order of over 1,500 yard radius and citizens were taken to a facility nearby.
The fire eventually died down by the early evening and did not spread to the cargo. People were able to return home and the highway was reopened before 6:30 p.m.
It was thanks for Rod Cardinal’s quick thinking that the incident didn’t escalate to something catastrophic.