The driver of a tractor-trailer on a gravel logging road, owned by the company he works for, might not be operating on what seems to be his side of the road. In fact, either side of the road is his.
To operate on that road, that driver doesn't even need a license. There is no speed limit.
Though police could arrest him for operating under the influence or driving to endanger, there is some question as to what might constitute the latter offense.
"What's the middle of the road?" Somerset County Sheriff Barry A. DeLong asked, when questioned about any rules that might pertain to loggers. "It's private property, like you're driving through a field. If you drive in a field, do you have to bear to the right? How do you tell people how to drive on their property?"
All well and good -- maybe. But the companies and individuals who own logging roads make them open to the public -- a public that might drive them like they would any other road. Someone driving a car on such a road probably doesn't thinking that a huge truck would be bearing down on him or her, straight on, around a sharp curve.
A young man from Pennsylvania will never get a second chance to learn that lesson. Joseph Heim was just 18 when his sport utility vehicle collided with an empty logging truck around a sharp bend on Lower Enchanted Road in West Forks, on July 19.
Police said that Heim, working in the area for a rafting company, collided with the trailer, and was found dead at the scene. An investigation into the accident continues.
DeLong, who began patrolling Somerset County in 1973, emphasizes that people vacationing on private roads are guests.
"The truck drivers don't want to hurt anybody," he said. "They're out there to make a living. Loads of 100,000 pounds don't stop easily."
Lane Thomas of Chesterville has been driving a logging truck for 16 years. Like many in the northern woods, Thomas, 41, drives on roads owned by Plum Creek Timber Co.
Thomas works for Bernard Williams Trucking of Farmington, owned by his father-in-law.
He urges people to use citizens-band (CB) radios, because truckers announce their mile position on logging roads each mile. And Thomas urges people to be extra careful around corners, because they might be meeting a cab that is one place, and a trailer in another.
"If you're going to make a sharp corner, the trailer's not right behind you," he said. "It's 10 feet over. Your trailer is not going to be following you."
Thomas said he has noticed an increase in cars, ATVs and snowmobile trailers on the logging roads. Trucks hauling snowmobiles are a particular problem, he said, because they're operating on icy roads.
"I believe the sportsmen and the loggers could share the road if they would just do it right," he said. "Slow down on the corners. Use a CB radio. When people go on these roads, they should be aware."
Thomas said the stretch of Lower Enchanted Road that Heim was killed on is known as "Garfield Corner," named for a man who wrecked his pickup truck in an accident there.
Scott Mason of Bingham, who works for Reggie Gilbert Logging of Skowhegan, said that awareness is key.
"It's better to go into the ditch than hit a truck," Mason said.
Richard Chamberlain, a supervisor at Plum Creek's Bingham office, said some people from out of state act like the northern Maine woods are a national park.
"They don't know the dangers," Chamberlain said. "They've got to stay to the right and slow down."
Logging roads vary greatly in width. Some are as wide as a paved country road. Others are quite narrow and some, like Lower Enchanted, is somewhere in between, according to Somerset Chief Deputy Ronald Moody.
One gravel road -- an old railroad bed -- that follows Austin Stream from Austin Pond in Bald Mountain Township to Bingham is of the wider variety. On a recent day, 80-year-old Albert Sands of Dover-Foxcroft, his son Roger and his grandsons stopped at the bottom of a small hill on the road. As they have for years, the men were panning for gold on the stream and enjoying nature.
Shortly after they parked their two vehicles on the side of the road, a big rig loaded with wood came down the hill toward them. Apparently unhappy that another party had parked not far enough to the side, the trucker honked his horn.
"Get over as far as you can when you see a truck coming," Albert Sands advised.
Roger Sands said he usually knows when a truck is headed his way, but wishes they would go slower coming down hills.
"The dust sometimes will precede those bellows, and you want to move over," he said. "You can hear them coming. They scare the devil out of you.
"Speed is the problem. But they have to get it up to go back up hills with all that weight."
North Maine Woods, a huge multiple-use management area, is run by private forest landowners and state governmental agencies. North Maine Woods advises vacationers of camping areas, proper land use, and the proper way to drive on the remote roads.
"We tell them to pull over if they meet a log truck," said Gloria Caron, a North Maine Woods checkpoint manager. "North Maine Woods is a multiple-use area, but primarily, it's a working forest. And it works."
Caron said logging trucks are bigger and faster then they were years ago, and that more people are coming from all over to enjoy the Maine wilderness. Most vacationers use the wider, main logging roads, she said.
Landowners are strict regarding safety, Caron said.
"If the truckers have a reputation for driving unsafely, they get rid of them," she said. "It's not something they quibble about."
By the same token, truckers are working for those who own the roads.
DeLong recalled a day he was duck hunting in Pleasant Ridge. A trucker gave him the option of pulling over or getting hit.
"From that day on, I had a lot more respect," he said.Maine Morning Sentinel
