By BOB MARTIN
Eagle Times Staff
A tractor trailer being driven by a Claremont man recently caught fire in Winhall, Vermont, and while emergency personnel was able to extinguish the blaze with no injuries reported, it was a close call as it was hauling 8,000 gallons of gasoline.
“It could have been terrible,” said Arnold Craigue, who was operating a rental truck while his usual truck was having repairs done. “I was going up Bromley Mountain, which is fairly steep, and I had 8,000 gallons of gasoline on. I was getting near the top, probably doing 40, 45, and I started to smell smoke. It was a weird smell I had never smelled before.”
According to a press release by the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), on July 26 at 10:33 a.m., DMV Enforcement was notified that the tractor trailer was on fire on VT 11 in Winhall in the vicinity of Bromley Mountain.
Craigue, 63, of Claremont, was driving a 2017 Freightliner for Abenaqui Carriers of North Hampton, New Hampshire. He hauls gasoline for the company, and that day he had driven from White River Junction to Albany, New York, and was on his way back after loading. Craigue was on the road for just under two hours when the blaze started.
“I looked out my passenger mirror and there was smoke going down the side of the truck,” Craigue said. “I automatically started rolling the window down on the driver side; I’ve got a phobia of locking myself out of the truck. I see that smoke, and when I looked I see fire coming up over the windshield wipers.”
He told officials that flames started coming out from under the hood while driving east on VT 11. Craigue pulled over onto the shoulder and awaited the arrival of Winhall Fire Department. Craigue said he didn’t need to apply the brakes, as he believes an airline may have blown off and burned up. He reached down and turned the key off, opened the door, and the fire was coming inside.
When the air flow stopped, the fire went back underneath the hood. Craigue didn’t have his wallet or phone on him, and he had ideas of going back and getting it. He thought better of it, which ended up being the right choice.
“I took about two steps and it burst right up into flames again,” Craigue said. “It was gone in 10 or 12 minutes. The fire department did an excellent job. When they got there, they put water right onto the tank and kept the rear tires cool. If it had got into the rear tires it would have been really bad.”
Winhall Fire Department Safety Officer Stuart Coleman said fire personnel was at the scene in less than 10 minutes, showing how quickly this fire went up. Coleman said they used water and foam to put out the blaze.
“We had multiple mutual aid companies coming, and as it was, we didn’t use many of their resources,” he said. “But with this potential, dramatic situation, I called for lots of backup. We were in a spot with no hydrants and water. We had to truck in our own water. It was halfway between the 11 and 30 intersection. We were lucky there weren’t any exposures and lucky we put it out when we did.”
Coleman added, “If it had been another five minutes we might not have been able to save the trailer,” he said.
The road was shut down entirely for about an hour-and-a-half, which he knows was probably inconvenient for the public, but was needed for a situation as dire as this.
No injuries were reported by firefighters, and Craig was unscathed, as well.
Craig said it was “about as close as I ever want to do it again.”
He added that this had never happened to him as a truck driver and was looking forward to getting back to his regular truck.
DMV Inspectors found evidence that pointed to the fire starting in the forward portion of the engine compartment, according to the release. An exact cause was not determined due to the extensive heat and fire damage. Craigue said he conferred with emergency personnel about what could have happened. He said it was “one of those freak accidents that hopefully never happens again.”
“I looked at it, a couple DOT officers, the fire chief looked at it,” Craigue said. “We all kind of determined that something in the front might have let go, like the oil cooler. That is where the seat was. Maybe an oil line from the oil cooler blew and threw it up onto terminal charge running about 1800 degrees coming up the hill.”
Coleman said there wasn’t enough left of the truck to even really decide what happened.
“We’re just happy it didn’t turn into a major incident,” he said. “With 8,000 gallons of gasoline on board, when I got there you could tell it was a tractor trailer because it was hooked to a trailer, but there was nothing left of the cab.”
It was deemed a complete loss and recovered by Sabil & Sons Towing. A dispatcher with Abenaqui Carriers said the company was declining to comment on the fire. Messages were left with Vermont DMV, but calls were not immediately returned.
