We had a dusting of snow at our home last Saturday night, but the promised wind and 6-12 INCHES of snow had missed us. Of course, we are in the mountains of northern NM, and our target destination was Carlsbad, in the flatlands of the southeasten part of the state. The weather in one does not reflect the weather in the other. OTOH, the weathermen on the Albuquerque TV stations were forecasting calming winds, down to darned near dead calm by evening. Radio stations were useless, all playing national sports talk shows or repeats of national talk shows, national news blasts on the hour, but no live local anything from the robo-stations I was picking up.
The wind started picking up when we were about half way between Vaughn and Roswell, a wonderful stretch of absolute emptiness.
By the time I realized we were in trouble, I thought it made more sense to keep going to Roswell, where there were stores, food, and hotels. Vaughn only has a service station and a diner (we later discovered there was at least one hotel). The wind was coming from our right and slightly behind, and although it was making the trailer sway, I thought we were okay. I wasn't thinking about gusts, though.
I was probably going 50 when it started going over. The floor was 62" wide on a 48" wide trailer frame, so it acted as an outrigger, dragging on the road but not quite going all the way over. In fact, with the hitch as a pivot point, and the driver's side tire still on the ground, a 51-year-old mom fueled with lots of adrenaline can just push that trailer back up onto its wheels, bang!
It had surprisingly little damage.
Unfortunately, a later tip, just outside of Roswell, split the seam there on the front driver's side (and scraped off another 2 inches or so of the floor and foam), and twisted the trailer hitch and the plate that bolts the a-frame tongue pieces. I think if I replace those, the tongue will be straight.
The trip was ruined, of course. The trailer was mostly intact, but the kids didn't want to camp in it even if the winds began to calm after sunset, as is common. I understood, but we really weren't prepared to stay in a hotel. It was mid-afternoon when we decided to just go home. With the trailer hitch bent, though, I wasn't going to try to pull the trailer back as it was. Probably fueled by that adrenaline still, I decided to finish the work that the wind and the road had started. I bought a drywall saw and a utility knife at Wally-World (we were in their parking lot, convenient to a lunch at Chili's Grill and some walking around/calming down) and started cutting. Actually, I cut about 15 inches above the floor and we pulled that part down on the ground and sat in it for a few minutes. The windows were in the wrong place, of course, but I think we have approximately the right size for the new, shorter trailer just from doing that. Kind of an expensive and dangerous way to figure out the right size, but there we are. We piled our salvaged parts back in the remaining 15" walls of the trailer box (the windows survived without a scratch) and headed home.
Yeah, I know I over-reacted and over-destroyed. But it kinda felt good, and it was a clear end-point for that camper. And our now short-walled trailer didn't even sway in the wind, even with the twisted hitch.
Of course, looking at it with the curve at the front, dear daughter declared that we should make the next one look like a boat.
The end. version 1. Stay tuned for version 2.
Posted: Wed Nov 07, 2012 7:27 am
... So Glad you’re OK !!!
Crumbs for thought ... 
