Man survives after truck falls down cliff

by Danielle Switalski
| July 31, 2010 4:17 PM

A Kalispell man survived being trapped in his dump truck for over an hour after the truck fell approximately 50 feet over a cliff in Heron on Wednesday morning.

The truck was driving up Elk Creek in Heron down a narrow road that is currently undergoing construction. According to Travis Wilson, Fire Chief for the Noxon Volunteer Fire Department, the alleged reason for the wreck was due to the narrowness of the road as the dump truck's back wheels got too close to the outside corner of the road causing the truck to slip. The weight of the belly dump then pulled the entire truck over the edge.

"They are rebuilding the road up there and it's really narrow and a little windy road and the road is really soft and I think the truck got too close to the edge and it slipped off," said Wilson.

The truck ultimately landed upside down and the driver survived, trapped inside for over an hour and a half before rescue crews were able to remove him from the truck and pull him up the mountain.

Rescue crews had to use the Jaws of Life, cutting through the door, seat and gear shift of the truck in order to pull the man from the vehicle. The Sanders County Mountain Rescue Team then used their technical rope gear to hoist the man back up the rocky mountainside and get him to safety. Mike Bedick, President of the Sanders County Search and Rescue team said it took around a half an hour to remove the man from the truck.

The man was then flown by Medstar to a hospital in Idaho where he was treated for injuries.

"I think he was actually in pretty good shape by the way he looked after we got him out," said Wilson.

Wilson said the call came in around 8:30 a.m. Wednesday morning. In addition to the Noxon Volunteer Fire Department, Sanders County Search and Rescue, the Heron Fire Department and the Noxon Ambulance responded to the wreck.