The six Mack dump trucks looked old before their time, having labored round the clock, six days a week, hauling rubble from the World Trade Center site in New York City. And they made a final contribution, earning enough cash in a recent auction to raise $150,000 for the United Ser.vice Orga.ni..zation, which supports military men and women now hunting down terrorists in Afghanistan and elsewhere.
People from Mack Trucks, a dozen of its dealers and a handful of trade-press reporters gathered at Gabrielli Mack Sales & Service in nearby Jamaica, N.Y., for the special auction in late May. Earlier that morning we had visited the WTC site, and had been sobered by the sacred aura that enveloped it.
Now Mack had special plans for the trucks. In the days following the devastating terrorist attack on Sept. 11, headquarters execs had found the trucks on dealer lots and loaned them to the City of New York. Starting in late October, drivers from the city's transportation department ran them hard, averaging 22 loads a day of twisted steel, bent pipe, smashed glass, crushed concrete, trash from thousands of offices, and sometimes human remains, to a landfill on Staten Island.
Municipal and privately operated trucks carted millions of tons of rubble out of the WTC site in a process that finished four months sooner than originally estimated. A DOT official said the loan of the six Mack dumpers allowed city employees to contribute to the huge cleanup effort.
The six Macks – five Granite CV713s and a CL713 – worked 149 days until the site was officially cleared. Mechanics in Gabrielli's shop had maintained them, and cleaned them up for the auction. Cabs and chassis were in good shape, but their steel bodies were badly dented from rubble dropped aboard by excavators. So the trucks weren't exactly creampuffs, even with low miles (ranging from 3,576 on a Granite to 7,733 on the CL).
Still, civic-minded dealers bid high prices. The modern Granites each brought $74,000 to $81,000, while the older-style CL713 was a comparative bargain at $67,000. The CL went to Bob Nuss of Mack Trucks of Rochester (Minn.), who said he already had a buyer – a demolition contractor who was also an old-car and truck collector. The “Ground Zero” Macks will probably be collector items, given their connection with the tragedy, which is commemorated by special medallions affixed to their grills.
The $150,000 for the USO was the difference between the trucks' wholesale value and the generous amounts bid by the dealers, plus whopping prices paid in an auction of novelty items. One Granite was bought by Armando Gabrielli, so it stayed on the premises for resale. Others were driven gratis to their dealers, courtesy of Jim Johnston of Hook-Up Inc., the drive-away service out of Joplin, Mo. Maybe you saw one on the road.
