First time I've seen this happen

[Basilbrush]

I was on the M5 northbound this afternoon, I came across a sign warning of a lane closure. When we got there, a heavy haulage low loader carrying a big NCK navvy was sat on the hard shoulder & out into lane one. It was obvious the trailer had broken its back. There was another big low loader in front of it & they were preparing to tranship the machine. When I came back down about an hour & 15 minutes later, they'd re-loaded the NCK in lane two & were no doubt waiting for another low loader to remove the one with the broken back. Meanwhile they'd generated the mother of all traffic jams behind it.

One of those times you realise you've left the camera behind when it's too late.

BB

[Jack]

Would have loved to have seen pictures of that, what company they from?

[Hammer man]

Thats interesting.I was coming home from Shrewsbury yesterday lunchtime on the M5 southbound just past Birmingham when i saw what locked like a large navvy(blue & yellow)minus its boom/front end heading northbound.
Wonder if they were connected?

[Basilbrush]

Would have loved to have seen pictures of that, what company they from?

I didn't see the name on the machine or lowloader Jack, I was just shocked to see what l was looking at. The low loader waiting to load the machine away was a big dark blue scania.

When I got home I looked on here, http://www.trafficengland.com/motorwayflow.aspx to see if I could see anything of it on the camera but due to it being dark all I could see was a solid block of headlights.

I kicked myself because my camera is with me 99% of the time but due to my pickup being hit I'd brought it home to download photos of the damage & I'd left the dam thing here.

BB

[Basilbrush]

Thats interesting.I was coming home from Shrewsbury yesterday lunchtime on the M5 southbound just past Birmingham when i saw what locked like a large navvy(blue & yellow)minus its boom/front end heading northbound.
Wonder if they were connected?

It wouldn't have been the same machine Hamerman, I saw it at around 245pm & it was still sitting on the broken trailer with the rescue low loader sat in front of it waiting for the highways people to get the lane closure in place. When I came back down past it was on the good trailer & I reckon that was around 4pm give or take 5 minutes.

BB

[Hammer man]

I did`nt mean the same machine .
No i meant i wonder if there were a few machines they were shifting from "a to b".You dont see many "navvys" being moved these days.It was funny that there were 2 machines on the same road withing days of each other

[john345me]

I was on the M5 northbound this afternoon, I came across a sign warning of a lane closure. When we got there, a heavy haulage low loader carrying a big NCK navvy was sat on the hard shoulder & out into lane one. It was obvious the trailer had broken its back. There was another big low loader in front of it & they were preparing to tranship the machine. When I came back down about an hour & 15 minutes later, they'd re-loaded the NCK in lane two & were no doubt waiting for another low loader to remove the one with the broken back. Meanwhile they'd generated the mother of all traffic jams behind it.

One of those times you realise you've left the camera behind when it's too late.

BB

if the low loader was a red volvo it was parked on the A350 in the morning as i was driving into melksham just off j17 M4 the name on the low loader was northen cant remmber the rest of the name did the crane have a yellow back end?

[samk706]

Can anyone explain to me what a navvy is ? ?

thanks sam

[BulldozerD11]

Its the early name often used for a Steam Shovel, Steam Navvy, that became shortened to Just Navvy. It probably came into use when the first steam shovels were used to dig project like the Panama Canal and the Manchester Ship Canal.

Derived from the old navigators who dug the canals with a wheel barrow and shovel and from place to place who were referred to as navvy's. Also used for the early (mainly) Irish ground workers on sites. (navigation being an old name for a canal i.e a navigatable waterway).

Wikipedia definition here; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navvy

Dave

[martyn williams]

Its always the same,not having your camera when something happens.Saw a D9R a few years ago.