Caterpillar - Finning Canada

Steve FladhammerHow do you get a piece of equipment weighing 13 metri ctons to a customer with no road access? For Finning(Canada), in Terrace, British Columbia, this kind of challengeis met head-on – with helicopters.Finning customer, Nova Gold Resources Inc. is inthe planning stages to begin development of its GaloreCreek property located about 150 kilometres northeast ofStewart, B.C., and nearly 500 kilometres north of Terrace.The Galore Creek prospect is rated as the highest-gradegold, silver and copper deposit in North America.This April, Finning (Canada) technicians SteveFladhammer and Jerry Keeping began the delivery missionwith the tear down of a Caterpillar IT28G wheelloader and a 312C backhoe into 4.5-metric ton (or less)segments. The pieces were loaded onto lowboys andfl atbeds. The crew made a six-hour trek up the CassiarHighway to the Bob Quinn airstrip.Vancouver Island Helicopter Ltd. brought in itsRussian-made Kamov helicopter, which is big and powerfulenough to carry loads weighing up to 4,500 kilograms.The disassembled pieces of the loader and backhoe weretethered for fl ight to the Galore Creek camp. Eight, 55-minute round trips over a day-and-a-half period landedboth machines safely on site for assembly.Finning’s Fladhammer not only had the job of gettingthe two Cats put back together and operating, he had toget existing equipment on site up and running. “Some ofthe pieces of equipment were sitting up there from explorationyears before,” he says. And to add to the challenge:“There was between eight and 12 feet of snow at thecamp,” Fladhammer says. “Everything had to be dug out.We had to dig down to the tool shed.” The Finning technicianspent a week at the Galore Creek camp, getting thejob done.The future for the Galore Creek prospect is bright.Along with mine development, plans are in the works tobuild a major access road to Stewart, B.C., which willbecome the access point to the Pacifi c Ocean for shippingore to markets.www.finning.ca Summer 2005 • TRACKS & TREADS 29