I used to repair snow equipment, rotaries, graders, OshKosh wing trucks etc on site for a little income in the winter when construction was slow. Had a 350 Dodge 4x4 service truck grossly overloaded with tools, welder, compressor etc and that thing was a tank in the snow. They called one morning, needed some welding on a grader, guy said, "the sun came out yesterday and melted the pack on the road and then it snowed a little last night and it is ugly up there this morning". Over confident, I headed up the hill without putting on the chains, got to the grader ok, parked on the road, unrolled my leads and commenced welding. Head down, welding away, I feel the welding lead tug out of my hand...I look up, there goes my service truck, down the hill. The hot tires had melted the skiff of snow on top of the ice and away she goes...slow motion disbelief...my entire livelihood at the mercy of gravity. Got damn lucky, as she started off the edge, the rough dirt on the shoulder stopped the slide. I was a lot more cautious after that, on ice.
