Massive truck and load would test Haines port and highway

The load will weigh more than a half-million pounds -- perhaps the biggest ever moved over an Alaska road. The truck-trailer combo used to carry it will be 218 feet long, have 20 axles with 122 tires, and add another 200,000 pounds to the package. Haines Borough and Alaska Department of Transportation officials are studying whether the Haines dock and the Haines Highway can handle the job of transferring a huge electrical transformer to a power station in Canada's Yukon territory, reports the Chilkat Valley News.

[Haines Borough facilities chief Brad] Maynard is tasking PND Engineers of Juneau with assessing if the borough's roll-on, roll-off dock can accommodate the weight, and if not, what reinforcements are necessary. Other modifications may have to be made at Lutak Dock, but Maynard is optimistic."I think it's doable. I've been looking into it a little bit," he said.

While the weight would be considerable, it would be distributed over multiple axles. Per axle, it would be less weight than a large forklift carrying a 30-ton container van, he said. ...

Though Skagway offers a more direct route to Carmacks, the Klondike Highway won't be used because the Capt. William Moore Bridge north of Skagway can't hold that much weight, according to Rex Young, chief of commercial vehicle enforcement for the state Department of Transportation.
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