Police are advising Highway 99 travellers to give themselves extra time Tuesday (March 23) as crews may take all day to clear a crash site involving a 60-ton truck crane.
"It'll be an all-day process," said Cpl. Dave Ritchie. "It's a huge crane."
The linkbelt truck crane was still lying at the bottom of an 80-foot embankment near Conroy Creek Forest Service Road along Highway 99 Monday (March 22), three days after going off the road.
Tuesday's recovery is not anticipated to create long delays since the four-lane section and wide highway median will allow for north and southbound traffic.
"We're anticipating that we're going to be able to activate the median, use two lanes for recovery and we'll still have two lanes," said Ritchie.
The truck went down the embankment in the early evening of Friday (March 19) after the 41-year-old driver lost control about 23 kilometres north of Squamish. He was transported to hospital with undetermined injuries, according to RMCP reports.
The traffic was "slow going" for a period of time on Friday with one lane closed, however the four-lane section of road allowed for easy rerouting, said Ritchie.
Numerous agencies responded to Friday's accident to contain the 150 gallons of hydraulic fuel and 80 gallons of diesel fuel the truck was carrying, including the Ministry of Environment, Provincial Emergency Program, Whistler Fire Rescue and members of the military from CFB Shilo, who happened to be in the area for Paralympic closing ceremony security.
It's unclear how much of the fluids leaked into Conroy Creek. The response units used absorbent material to clean up the contamination as far as 300 metres downstream. "There are still absorbent towels around the truck and in the creek today," said Ritchie on Monday.
