Wire Cutter – Interstate 215, CA

We only had 175 miles to go from the Acton Thousand Trails RV Park to our winter digs in Santee, CA. So, we didn’t exactly get up early to leave; expecting a nice leisurely drive getting through before the San Diego rush hours traffic clogged the roads. We headed east to I-15 and eventually got onto I-215 to bypass most of the LA traffic. Just north of the CA-74 exit to Hemet, CA (about 100 miles into the trip) we heard a muffled sound of something hitting or breaking off truck. No lights/messages came up on the console and everything seemed to drive as usual. A few miles (maybe as many as 5) the “low tire pressure” indicator came one.

We still weren’t worried/suspicious – we had gotten new tire about 3 weeks ago and figured that the techs forgot to reset the pressure sensors – that has happened twice before with tire repairs or changes. Still we weren’t hearing any flat tire sounds, so we immediately checked for the next exit. Getting off at CA-74, we headed East looking for either an accessible gas station (remember when towing a 32’ 5th Wheel not all stations are roomy enough for us to enter and turn around) or a safe shoulder that we could pull over on. Again about 2-3 miles East we saw a gas station and turned down the street realizing immediately that there wasn’t enough room for us. Luckily, the road was a wide 4-lane boulevard with ample shoulder for us to pull over on. We both got out to investigate – here are pictures of what we saw!

We called our Good Same Roadside Assistance number and waited for someone to come out and change the truck tire. We were only going 55 mph as that is the towing speed limit in California. What we were able to determine is that as we drove over the wire-cutter, the front tire grabbed it and projected it into our rear tire making a ¾-1” gash between the nice new strong treads. (Later the tire guy said that if the hole was bigger than a ball point pen ink cartridge, it was un-repairable – so an almost new tire is replaced.) the cutters were not done travelling through the air with destruction in mind. The rear tire, now hissing out air, spun the wire cutter back and drove the HANDLE into the RV wall about 1½-1¾”. Luckily, the location of the hole caused no internal damage to the RV.

We wonder what would have happened to the wire cutter projectile, if the RV hadn’t stopped it. It was gaining altitude and could have gone into a following vehicle’s radiator or windshield and we wouldn’t have even known as we would have been traveling away from the event.

When Roadside Assistance arrived we needed to unhook the RV and pull the truck forward about 6 feet; so that the jack only had to lift the truck. When he was finished, we backed up, re-hooked to the RV and were on our way. So 175 miles ended up taking 6½ hours and we got to our RV site just before sunset.