Recovered !
An employee of a friend was walking her dog Thurs. night and spotted it at the bottom of a gravel pit on the NE side of Tucson. Not knowing the vehicle was stolen, but thinking someone may be trapped in or under it, she crawled down to investigate and grabbed the registration out of the glovebox. Unfortunately there were no bodies under or around it.
She told her boss about it Friday morning and he immediately called.
Whoever was driving it obviously had some fun before pushing or driving it over a 60' cliff into the abandoned pit, it was thoroughly covered with mud. The crusier hit the side of the cliff face, landed on its nose, and did a half twist coming to rest on the drivers side pointed at the cliff face. The thief(s) then tried to use the hi-lift to right the cuiser and even pulled out the winch cable although they may have not initially noticed the power cable to it was severed in the fall.
The cops had called a towing company (Gary's) to assist in the recovery but their 4wheel drive vehicle recovery expert wanted to pull my cruiser back up the cliff face rather than using a chain saw to remove a few mesquites, push it back on its wheels, and pull it down the slope to the bottom as I thought would be best. Gary himself arrived to see how much money they could gouge me out of and while I did not think the $125.00 an hour was outrageous I thought their methods might take more than a few hours. After arguing with Gary, toe to toe face to face, I told him I did not need his services and proceeded to call a few friends and grabbed my chainsaw.
Borderland was doing some earthwork nearby and I caught up with the foreman as they were calling it quits for the day. Five of their guys and one big loader helped me get the cruiser out the way I thought would be best, it took about a half hour. We righted it with the hi-lift jack, bending it in the process, and I steered while being pulled backward with one flat tire by the loader.
I called another tow company and will now begin the process of checking every nut and bolt.
I have some pictures I'll try to post soon, it is somewhat amazing how little obvious damage occured with the fall. The full cage tied to frame did not look tweaked at all. The hood is kinda wavy butthe front fenders with their tubed edges are straight. The tube was also straight where it wraps around the rear wheelwells although the body got punched in a bit behind the tube. Axles and springs look okay.... fluid leaks everywhere.
Thanks again to everyone for helping me try to locate it, my kids are smiling again.
