Killdozer w/pic

[Spartacus]

Quote:
Marvin John Heemeyer (October 28, 1951 – June 4, 2004) was a skilled American welder and owner of an automobile muffler repair shop. On June 4, 2004, frustrated over a failed zoning dispute, Heemeyer used a Komatsu D355A bulldozer modified with armor in the forms of steel and concrete to demolish the town hall, a former judge's home and other buildings in Granby, Colorado. The rampage ended when the bulldozer became immobilized. After a standoff with law enforcement agencies, Heemeyer died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.


Heemeyer used an armor-plated Komatsu D355A bulldozer to destroy 13 buildings in Granby, ColoradoHeemeyer had been feuding with officials and individuals in Granby, particularly over fines for violating city ordinances and a zoning dispute regarding a concrete factory constructed opposite his muffler shop that destroyed his business.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Heemeyer

 

[Cal_21]

That's intense.

 

[Spartacus]

Heemeyer took about a year and a half to prepare for his rampage. In notes found by investigators after the incident, Heemeyer wrote "It's interesting how I never got caught. This was a part-time project over a 1 1/2 year time period." In the notes, Heemeyer expressed surprise that three men who visited the shed last fall did not discover the bulldozer work, "especially with the 2,000 lb. lift fully exposed." "Somehow their vision was clouded," he wrote.[8]

The piece of construction equipment used in the incident was a Komatsu D335A bulldozer fitted with makeshift armor plating covering the cabin, engine and parts of the tracks. In places, the vehicle's armor was over one foot thick, consisting of concrete sandwiched between sheets of steel to make ad-hoc composite armor. This made the machine impervious to small arms fire and resistant to explosives; three external explosions and over 200 rounds of firearm ammunition fired at the bulldozer had no effect on it.[1] National Guard units were placed on standby orders under Governor Bill Owens, as the deployment order has to be made directly from the Governor due to requirement of Posse Comitatus Act.[9]

For visibility, the bulldozer was fitted with three video cameras linked to monitors mounted on the vehicle's dashboard.[1] Onboard fans and an air conditioner were used to keep Heemeyer cool while driving and compressed air nozzles were fitted to blow dust away from the video cameras. Food, water and life support were present in the almost airtight cabin. Heemeyer had no intention of ever leaving the cabin once he entered; the hatch was permanently sealed

 

[Spartacus]

goddamn
I was wondering how he managed for vision

 

[Spartacus]

needto get in here and have a look at this

how come we didn't hear about this back in '04

 

[Cal_21]

They should've had snipers shoot out his camera lenses. That's really crazy. I'm surprised I never heard of this event.

 

[Spartacus]

On June 4, 2004, Heemeyer drove his armored bulldozer through the wall of his former business, the concrete plant, the Town Hall, the office of the local newspaper that editorialized against him, the home of a former judge's widow, and a hardware store owned by another man Heemeyer named in a lawsuit, as well as others. Owners of all the buildings that were damaged had some connection to Heemeyer's disputes.[10]

Grand County Commissioner Duane Daley said Heemeyer apparently used a video camera and two monitors found inside to guide the dozer. Authorities speculated Heemeyer may have used a homemade crane found in his garage to lower the armor hull over the dozer and himself. "Once he tipped that lid shut, he knew he wasn't getting out,"

 

[Spartacus]

Despite the great damage to property, with 13 buildings destroyed,[11] most requiring hundreds of thousands of dollars to be replaced, no one besides Heemeyer was killed.[1] Total damage was estimated at several million dollars.

Defenders of Heemeyer contended that he made a point of not hurting anybody during his bulldozer rampage. However, the sheriff's department argues that the fact nobody got hurt was due more to luck than intent. They asserted Heemeyer fired many bullets from his semi-automatic rifle at Cody Docheff when Docheff tried to stop the assault on his concrete batch plant by using a front-end loader

 

[Spartacus]

front-end loader vs killdozer

they needto make a movie of this

 

[Spartacus]

front-end loader

 

[SaladFork]

 

[Spartacus]

 

[Spartacus]

http://farkleberries.blogspot.com/2004/06/killdozer-in-colorado-epilogue.html


Rage slid into the armored cab of the giant bulldozer parked on the edge of town late Friday afternoon and slowly rumbled to life.

Sealed inside, rage released the brake to the black and yellow beast, and it easily plowed through the wall of the building it had been housed in for months. Rage was loose. Rage was Marvin Heemeyer.
With writing like that, I know someone's itching to make a movie out of this...but with the immediacy of today's media coverage, who needs CGI when you have the real thing? The Denver Post appears to be carrying the most direct coverage of the event, including this article on Marvin Heemeyer, with recollections from family and neighbors.

A lot of people in Granby (and elsewhere) will be having nightmares about that bulldozer attack for some time to come, a blind, dull-gray steel juggernaut thundering in on them before they wake in a cold sweat. There's something very primal, cunning and nightmarish about Heemeyer's deed.

I did have one thought, which I'm sure must have occurred to police as they tried to stop the "Armageddon Tank" (as townspeople have dubbed the monstrous bulldozer) - the only part of the machine that was really vulnerable was the caterpillar treads. If someone could have fired some type of explosive rounds into one of the treads (I'm sure in High Country Colorado somebody's got mortar rounds or a rocket-powered grenade somewhere, c'mon...), breaking some of their links, the bulldozer would have been unmaneuverable and limited to spinning around...maybe I'm missing something about the mechanics of caterpillar treads. Just a thought.


Everyman's Revenge
The elements that really grab people about this story, I think, are twofold: the revenge-fantasy-come-true aspect or "common man fights back against City Hall" thread, and the eerie thought that something this evil and destructive could have been cooked up by one individual working secretly in his garage. The level of detail Heemeyer put into his machine is pretty amazing: investigators' accounts say the bulldozer's three video cameras were outfitted with individual air tanks and blowers to remove visibility-obstructing debris. But he didn't count on a cooling system failure.

In retrospect, the extreme mechanical stress of operating the dozer at "high speed" with possibly obstructed cooling pathways, plus an additional load of 10+ tons of steel-and-concrete armor proved too much for the Cat D9R, and Heemeyer's rampage ended roughly halfway through his "hit list," according to documents poliec found at his home.

 

[Spartacus]

Residents of this mountain tourist town of 2,200 described a bizarre scene as the bulldozer slowly crashed through buildings, trees and lampposts, with dozens of officers walking ahead or behind it, firing into the machine and shouting at townspeople to flee.

"It looked like a futuristic tank," said Rod Moore, who watched the dozer rumble past within 15 feet of his auto garage and towing company.

One officer, later identified as Trainor, was perched on top, firing shot after shot into the top and once dropping an explosive down the exhaust pipe.

"He just kept shooting," Moore said. "The dozer was still going. He threw what looked like a flash-bang down the exhaust. It didn't do a thing."

A flash-bang produces a blinding flash and earsplitting boom designed to stun a suspect.

"Gunfire was just ringing out everywhere," said Sandra Tucker, who saw the bulldozer begin the rampage from her office on Main Street. "It sounded to me like an automatic rifle, firing about every second."

Town manager Tom Hale said Heemeyer was angry after losing a zoning dispute that allowed a cement plant to be built near his muffler shop. Heemeyer also was fined $2,500 in a separate case for not having a septic tank and for other city code violations at his business, Hale said.

When he paid the fine, he enclosed a note with his check saying "Cowards," Hale said.

"We felt he was venting his frustration that he didn't get his way," Hale said of the note. "We didn't think he was going to do something like this."

Trainor said he believes Heemeyer spent months armoring the bulldozer, and investigators were looking into whether he had help.

Hale said owners of all the buildings that were damaged had some connection to Heemeyer's disputes.

The buildings included the cement plant, a utility company, a bank, a newspaper office, a hardware store and warehouse, the home of former Mayor L.R. "Dick" Thompson and the municipal building, which also housed a library.

Crumpled patrol cars and service trucks lay in the dozer's path. A pickup was folded nearly in half and had been rammed through the wall of a building.

 

[Spartacus]

"God built me for this job," Heemeyer said in the first recording made on April 13, 2004. He even said it was God's plan that he not be married or have family so that he could be in a position to carry out such an attack. "I think God will bless me to get the machine done, to drive it, to do the stuff that I have to do" he said. "God blessed me in advance for the task that I am about to undertake. It is my duty. God has asked me to do this. It's a cross that I am going to carry and I'm carrying it in God's name," he said.[citation needed]

Heemeyer's actions were apparently a political statement. In the audio tapes, he states "Because of your anger, because of your malice, because of your hate, you would not work with me. I am going to sacrifice my life, my miserable future that you gave me, to show you that what you did is wrong".[18]

Investigators later found Heemeyer's handwritten list of targets. It was not just a list of buildings and businesses, police say. His list also contained the names of at least 10 individuals and a local Catholic Church

 

[Scotsman]

The news here in CO dubbed it the "Armaggedon Tank".

Cheers,
Scotsman

 

[juiceddreadlocks]

The news here in CO dubbed it the "Armaggedon Tank".

Cheers,
Scotsman

both times I've been up in granby coming home from RMNP I've asked about it, and nobody really seems to want to talk about it.