Never Drive Loveland Pass Behind a Fuel Truck

Sixty miles west of Denver, Interstate 70 goes into a mountain. The Eisenhower-Johnson Memorial Tunnel carries it under the Continental Divide through two bores about 1.7 miles long, with the west portal at 11,158 feet, the highest point on the entire Interstate Highway System. The westbound bore opened in March 1973, the eastbound in 1979. Almost every vehicle in Colorado can use it. Trucks carrying placarded hazardous materials cannot. Fuel tankers are banned from the tunnel year-round because a fire inside a long bore at that altitude could be catastrophic for everyone in it and could close the only Interstate across the mountains. Some materials, including explosives, are never allowed through at all. Instead, those loads go over the top. Loveland Pass on US Highway 6 climbs to roughly 11,990 feet, more than 800 feet higher than the tunnel, on steep grades and tight hairpin turns with long exposed drops. Reporting puts the number of hazmat trucks using it at around two hundred a day. It is also one of the most popular scenic drives in the area, which means ordinary drivers choosing the view end up in the same lanes as the loads the tunnel was built to keep out. When winter storms or avalanche control close the pass, the Colorado Department of Transportation does something unusual. At the top of the hour, it stops all other traffic, empties the tunnel, and escorts the waiting hazmat trucks through on their own. This video covers why the tunnel was built, why the most dangerous cargo on the highway is kept out of it, and what that decision means if you drive Loveland Pass yourself. Sources and further reading: Colorado Department of Transportation, Eisenhower-Johnson Memorial Tunnel operations, metering and hazmat escorts Colorado Department of Transportation, US 6 Loveland Pass road status Denver7, on the role of Loveland Pass for hazmat and fuel deliveries Summit Daily, reporting on hazmat traffic over Loveland Pass The figure of around two hundred hazmat trucks a day is a reported estimate. Published counts of workers killed during the tunnel's construction vary between sources. Check CDOT road conditions before you travel. Loveland Pass closes frequently in winter. If you have driven Loveland Pass, or hauled over it, tell me in the comments what it was actually like. The people who drive it regularly know things about it that no report records.