Photo by N49Photo.com
From the “we didn’t see this coming” department, a 2012 Toyota Tundra
CrewMax truck will tow the 300,000-pound space shuttle Endeavour the
last leg to its permanent home at the California Science Center in Los
Angeles. The 2012 Tundra will transport the historic vessel the last
quarter mile of its trip when the event takes place on October 13 of
this year. To prepare for such a project, Toyota worked with The Sarens
Group, a heavy lifting and transport company, to develop a custom
heavy-duty dolly.
Toyota claims the 2012 Toyota Tundra used for the stunt is an unmodified CrewMax model with a 381-hp
5.7-liter V-8 under the hood. The truck’s maximum sustained towing
capacity is 10,000 pounds. This isn’t the first time Toyota and the
California Science Center have worked together. Toyota has had a
partnership with the Science Center, and currently has a Tundra on
display at the museum as part of an exhibit demonstrating the physics of
leverage. That truck will be replaced by the one towing the Endeavour
when the Endeavour exhibit opens on October 30.
For more information on the Tundra Endeavour project, head to
Toyota.com/TundraEndeavour after September 17. When the Toyota Tundra
arrived for the 2008 model year, we named it the Motor Trend truck of the year but would never have guessed it might one day tow a space shuttle, even for just a quarter mile.
Towing in surrey can be very tricky to find sometimes, I wish that I had a Toyota Tundra like this to do some serious heavy duty towing!
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