Friday, March 6th, 2026, at 22:15 p.m. (PT), we received a request for help with an offroad recovery in California. The requester, Robert Wieland, submitted the following information: “2 miles up Panorama Road from Soda Lake Road. I have a Jeep Gladiator and a small trailer. Stuck about 20’ of the Road. I have the trailer dug out but need more power. A pull would be great. I have all the recovery gear necessary. We have sufficient supplies and are staying in the trailer. / I’m with the vehicle / I can help cover the cost of fuel.”
Our administrator, Al Fontan, contacted the requester and verified the contact information provided, GPS location, and current situation before sending the request to local volunteers. In this particular recovery, we contacted volunteers within a 65-mile radius.
The recovery was submitted late in the evening. Since the requester was on a RV, they were okay spending the night. We agreed to activate the search for volunteers in the morning when it would be daylight. We also requested a few photos in the morning. Around 7:00 a.m., we got back in contact, received the images, and started looking for volunteers.
From the group of volunteers we contacted, we got Chris Stephens and Jay Hebrard, marking themselves as engaging and taking over the recovery. Within 30 minutes of the request being released to volunteers, we had already two of them on their way.
The request was completed a little after 1 p.m. and some time after we received some photos and notes from the volunteers we share down below.
From Chris:
He had driven off the road to avoid a particularly bad spot in the road but unfortunately he broke through and got stuck in the thick clay mud just below the surface they were trying to get out for about 2 days
From Jay:
Pretty straight forward recovery, the soil conditions in California Valley are something that out of town folks are not used to. Looks dry but if you break through the crust it is clay under rather and there seems to be no bottom. It sticks to everything and doesn’t clear from the tires.
Having Chris and his son meet up was huge, it allowed us to daisy chain the two rigs together and stay on the road. We combined all of the ropes we had and stayed on the dry dirt.
Thanks to yankum, factor 55, and freedom ropes for the products we used today!
We want to thank Chris and Jay and all other participants for such great job. We also like to invite anybody who wants to join our volunteers. If you would like to receive a text message when we get an offroad recovery request near you, create your account here: offroadportal.org/signup