In the world's highest mountains...
are roads only the best can survive.
- There is no road in the U.S. that compares to anything here.
Where the road averages a death
every 4 1/2 minutes.
He's dead?
That's awful.
After six weeks in the Himalayas...
- Words can't describe that drop-off.
And their first run over the Rohtang Pass...
Turn a corner...
and the road's completely gone.
These North American truckers are settling in.
- What? You got something for me?
- Go! You got a ton of room.
Go!
- Dude, I can't get over anymore.
Now after a massive storm,
it's a battle to get back over the pass...
- Now because of all the snow and rain,
the whole road is washed.
- What's your BLEEP problem? You can BLEEP wait!
- I'm tired of being cold. I'm tired of being BLEEP.
Go, go, go, go, go!
- This is the most deadly thing I've ever done in my life.
They're just trying to stay alive...
in trucks with wooden frames.
- The splinters of wood... poke you like a pincushion.
Three truckers...
- The biggest scare I've had so far this year.
Two months...
If one of them hits the truck,
she's pretty much game over.
A race at the top of the world.
Today's toughest drivers take on history's deadliest roads.
- We've been hired on to bring stuff to this community
because it's been cut off forever.
Now we're stranded here ourselves.
We're at 11,000 feet right now
and the pass we go over is close to 14,000 feet,
so whatever weather we're gettin' here,
it's gonna be worse up there.
Still raining.
I was trying to learn colors.
Laal. That's red.
Give me the bill.
Last time I said "Give me the bill" in Hindi,
he laughed, and then I didn't get it for 30 minutes.
But I just wanna learn more about the people and the culture
and I may never come back, but if I do,
I'll have a leg up.
We got stranded here.
There's too much snow on top of the pass.
There's not enough people with snow shovels up there
to clear it out.
Today we're just gonna spend the day waitin' out the weather.
Hopefully, it clears up.
And I'm just gonna order breakfast.
More loads are waiting for them in Manali.
But to get them, the truckers have to climb back over
the 13,000-foot Rohtang Pass.
And no one knows when the pass will open.
- It's... one of those things. I'm debating what to do here.
I don't like sittin' here.
See what Dave's gonna do here.
I didn't order no hooker!
It's me.
Good morning, sir.
Come and sit by the fire.
Ah.
- I'm gonna see if they're gonna open that pass today.
It's a... well, it's a 50-50 shot, right?
So I could turn that corner,
and you know as well as I do she could be clear as a bell.
- I don't think that's gonna be happenin'.
Hey, I...
It stormed all night long.
Well...
I'm gonna stay behind.
- Better get my butt in gear and get on the road
if I'm gonna go.
All right, good luck.
All right, man.
Be safe.
Thanks, buddy.
- Stay out of trouble. - Never.
- Don't run no green and white buses off the road either.
- That's what I'm goin' for. - Yeah.
Housekeeping.
I think I'm gonna... - Let go.
- Try and run the gauntlet today.
- Are you? Isn't that kinda... silly?
- It could be completely sunny and clear over there,
and we don't know.
- Well, at least your day's full.
- We came here 'cause this town gets cut off and...
if I can get back quick to get another load, it helps them.
Might as well be the guinea pig,
and I do drive a little faster than you and Dave.
Finally got the shovel crew workin' double-time and then...
but yeah, so I'm gonna make the... the run,
so I guess I'm gonna go solo.
It should be all right.
Then we'll all know if the pass is open or not.
Yeah.
So if you don't hear from me,
I'll be having a beer in Manali.
- I'll be jealous if you make it through.
But I don't wanna freeze out there if we do get stuck, so...
- My gut feeling is the pass is closed.
You know, just goin' by yourself is just a...
I don't know, I think it's pretty risky, but...
you know, Rick seems to have that luck
as far as doing risky stuff and comin' out on top, so...
Let's go.
- Let's go, man. Run the gauntlet.
Let's go.
- Risky stuff seems to bite me in the ass sometimes.
- We're the only two that got balls, man.
Ha! Cold.
Cold!
- We gotta get him to Manali or he's gonna freeze to death.
I don't welcome death, but I sure tempt it once in a while.
But I'm not gonna know anything by sitting in the hotel room.
So I'm gonna go. What the hell?
Hopefully, he's safe.
Yeah, you don't want nothin' to happen.
- Well, we're goin' on a wing and a prayer here.
There's only one road to the pass...
and today it's a storm-battered river
of landslides and washouts.
- We got quite a bit of rain last night.
They should've weighted the vehicle.
When they start to slide, you can't steer, you can't stop.
Am I worried about the slippery roads?
Little bit.
But am I worried about landslides?
BLEEP yeah.
Well, right outta the gate,
we're seein' signs of landslides.
If one of them hits the truck,
she's pretty much game over.
Rock falls, rock falls.
A landslide.
Landslide, landslide!
If a landslide happened here,
it'd push you right off the cliff.
The rain weighs down and loosens the earth,
and once it's loose, a landslide can travel
over 100 miles an hour
and easily take out the wood frame truck.
We'll go get the rocks.
Let's go, boyo. Let's get it up there.
Okay! Let's go!
- If I don't see another one of them BLEEP today,
it'll be great.
I'm trying to make up some time here.
Not gonna lose faith in this yet.
Might as well hang out and wait till they finish cleaning it up.
Now I know why that... why that place gets shut off
from the world.
Hey, you.
- Lisa and Rick, you know, they've driven in ice roads.
I would probably be more comfortable
hangin' back for a couple hours,
maybe let this weather maybe clear out a little bit.
But then again, if we hang out here a couple hours,
that's just gonna put us that much farther behind
gettin' into Manali.
You ready to go?
No.
Okay.
BLEEP it.
With no bad news from Rick,
Lisa and Dave are now running for Manali.
- All right, let's get outta here.
You know how to drive in snow?
- Me? - Yeah.
- No. - No?
That's reassuring.
Kinda on my own today.
Got no backup plan.
- I don't wanna get stuck in the mud on an uphill,
so I'm kinda going as slow as I can
but just fast enough to make it, you know?
Oh, the road's kinda gone right there.
And I certainly don't wanna get very close to that edge.
I'm already slidin' everywhere.
I don't slide this much on ice at home.
This mud and water stuff is dangerous.
More than I thought, so...
I'm noticing any kind of wheel spin
is just causing this truck to slide.
I don't wanna go off an edge.
Oh, my gosh.
I'm having a heart attack.
That was not exactly fun.
The truck started to slide in the water over the edge there.
My heart's still pounding on that one.
I think that's the biggest scare I've had so far this year.
This is not a game.
This is serious.
Just up the road...
Now you got the road crew here
gettin' rid of this little bit of a slide
that's right in front of me.
Rick Yemm's at a standstill.
We sit, and we wait.
It's a standard thing in truckin' in this country.
- There's lines of traffic over here,
so something's going on over here.
Guess we caught up with you.
- Keep it comin', Dave. Lots of room down here.
- Which one of you guys caused this BLEEP?
We're good?
The joys.
Yep.
- I don't wanna get close to the rock slide up here
that's blockin' the road.
So in the meantime, while we're waiting...
I'm gonna work on fruits and colors.
Seb. Seb?
Apple is seb?
- We're still 90 kilometers away from Manali,
but with this road being closed,
who knows how long it's gonna be.
They're gettin' close. They're gettin' close.
There it is.
There it goes.
Look at that ginormous rock
right on the perch of that one thing.
Just sittin' there.
- Oof. - Ready?
- I'll push that big motherBLEEP over.
Here it goes!
Could you imagine that slammin' into the side of your house?
The side of your truck?
Boom!
- Look at this big motherBLEEP comin'.
Look at this thing.
Go, go, go, go, go!
Deep in the Himalayas,
North American truckers Rick Yemm and Dave Redmon
are in the middle of a landslide.
- Look at this big motherBLEEP comin'.
Go, go, go, go, go!
- I ain't sprinted like that in years.
- With these landslides, seeing it firsthand,
I still don't believe how unsafe things can be here.
BLEEP.
- Rick and Dave, you guys wanna turn around
or you wanna keep goin' forward?
That's... it's still crumbling.
- Mother Nature's kind of warning us to...
we better heed her warning.
All right, let's go back.
- I don't wanna come back to Keylong
because, you know, all that we had to go through.
So it's best to just go on, just go as far as we can.
That's better than driving this a couple more times.
Well, lead the way.
He just said lead the way.
So... here I go.
Leading the way.
- Ah, one of us is comin' with the season.
I guess we're gonna try and squeeze through.
And here we go.
I wanna go slow.
I- I'm crossing my fingers, hoping like crazy
that we don't go off the cliff.
- Man, she's sitting right where the slide is.
Come on, hurry up.
- We don't really need any more delays.
These rock slides, they, uh...
you know, they pop up at a moment's notice.
Oh, yeah, we got a big flood up here now.
Yeah, we got one hazard after another.
Now because of all the snow and rain,
the whole road is washed.
I've always thought that I've been adaptable
anywhere at anything I did.
But nothing could prepare anybody for this experience.
I'm sick of this road!
- Hey, Dave, take a tap on your brakes.
Just from them gettin' wet, they go to BLEEP.
When driving through deep water,
the Tata 1613's brake drums can be flooded.
If this happens, the water between the brake shoes and drum
can prevent the shoes from gripping the drums.
This will cause brake failure,
causing the driver to lose control of the truck.
- I'm not cocky enough to say that I could conquer this road.
This road conquers you.
You just go with it.
I don't... I don't wanna go.
I really don't wanna go up there.
Go, Lisa, go.
- What ya got goin' on up there, Rick?
Lisa stopped here, so...
gotta wait for her to get goin'.
I could push her across, I guess.
We have to check like this.
- Rather be goin', but one of those things
you gotta do sometimes.
All right.
Every time I say that there's no way I'd do that,
I end up really wanting to do it later in life.
- Ooh-ah, ooh-ah, honey, we made it.
Rick looks all right.
He's almost off.
Over here in India...
they just kinda slap things together.
- You have to keep your fingers crossed, boyo, it's open.
- Ah. - Hopefully, it's open.
No, no, no.
- If not, we gotta drive all the way back.
No.
Finally, Lisa, Rick, and Dave
pull over in the village of Koksar
below the north face of the Rohtang Pass.
On this ancient trade route,
this village is where weary travelers gather
before climbing the mountain...
and where this North American caravan will find out
if the road is passable.
- It's almost two feet snowfall last night in Rohtang.
Well, the road's closed.
- Might not be open tonight either.
They won't let us go any farther.
- They don't got anything here. I know that for a BLEEP fact.
Don't even have a heater to turn on.
We'll freeze to death.
- Marooned in the middle of nowhere.
We shoulda went back.
You know, we could have BLEEP went back
and... and done this tomorrow.
- There's a schedule that has to be kept.
Well, BLEEP the schedule.
You know what? The airplane has a schedule too.
And it goes right back home.
You know, this is gettin' to be a little bit too much for me.
I'm tired of being cold.
I'm tired of being BLEEP...
Just... everything.
Looks like we're turnin' around and goin' back.
Won't be open tonight.
May be open tomorrow.
- It was super-scary comin' through here, though,
the first time.
And I was trying to avoid comin' back through here... again.
But it looks like we don't have a choice.
- There's an extreme possibility that a BLEEP rock slide
could come down again, and we're stuck in between
with nowhere to go.
It's just... it's ridiculous.
It's a pain in the ass.
- We're just gonna park the truck.
Gonna go find us some heat and try and conquer it tomorrow,
see what Mother Nature has to offer.
Cranky-ass bitch today.
We got a good morning so far.
Pass should be open.
It didn't rain or anything last night,
so weather-wise, we should be good.
Do you see that cut?
That son of a bitch is deep.
You know, you can't dodge every rock in the road.
There's just too many of 'em.
I mean, I guess just tons of sharp shale rocks
that are just like knives and... you know.
If it ain't one thing, it's another.
You know, and now we're out here in the middle of nowhere,
and I got a cut in the tire.
There's nowhere to get a tire changed here, so...
you know, there's nothing you can do.
You just gotta keep goin' forward
and hope the tire don't blow out.
And if we can make it back to Manali tonight,
we'll just get it changed tonight
or first thing in the morning and deal with it then.
Yippity, yip-yip-yip-yip!
- All right, buddy, if you blow, then I'm behind ya.
- All right. - Okay, man.
I'm gonna hang out with Dave.
He's got a bad split in his steer tire there,
so... if it blows on him,
then... there's two trucks, two spares.
Better to have twice the equipment
in case something doesn't work.
- Ready? Let's blow this BLEEP, Batman.
Let's go.
- See if we can make it back to Manali tonight.
6,000 miles from home,
the North American truckers are making their second attempt
to escape Keylong and climb over the Rohtang Pass to Manali...
where their next load is waiting for pickup.
- It's kinda hard to wanna get my hopes up today,
because I might be let down.
- My biggest concern today is, I got a bad tire on the front.
It's got a big, huge cut in it.
It won't take much abuse.
- Who knows what kind of damage was done up there
with the storms or like... we just don't know.
Now we see the carnage and aftermath of the storms.
- Look at all the rocks in the road.
Rocks everywhere.
Whoa!
BLEEP.
Is that wheel okay?
We're gonna pull over right here, look at that,
make sure we didn't tear up anything.
10-4.
Yeah, you're all right.
- Yeah, we just nicked it with the lug nut.
Actually nicked it pretty hard.
See how we flattened it?
One more inch, and we'd have probably knocked that tire
right off the rim like a firecracker.
We'll be all right.
Okay.
Appreciate you pullin' over and waitin' for me.
No problem, man.
All right.
When I first got here, I had the attitude
that I just didn't need anybody.
I could do this on my own.
And I have come to realize that
in order to get out of here safely,
we need to stick together.
- I mean, this is the exact same spot
that it happened last time, so it's definitely
an active landslide area.
This stretch of road
is exactly where the mountain gave way yesterday.
Go, go, go, go, go!
- I'll do it. I'll do.
Stop, go, stop, go.
What do you want?
Let me park right under this rock slide.
It looks like a good place to park.
Oh, it's falling right now.
Can we go?
Can we go, Tashi?
Okay, good... let's go.
Runnin' the gauntlet in first gear.
Aah!
Oh, jeez.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah, it was.
So they were sayin' I couldn't do it
and you were like, "Nah, she can do it"?
Thank you.
They saw I was a woman; they pulled me over,
'cause they didn't think I could get through the landslide area.
I know I'm a woman in the man's profession,
so I mean, I've definitely been pulled over a lot more
because of blatant sexism.
It's reality, and I'm accepting it
and taking it for what it is and just working with it.
A few miles behind Lisa,
Rick and Dave are out of the landslide zone.
But now an old nemesis is back.
You...
motherBLEEP!
The green bus.
MotherBLEEP!
I see a bus driver stopped, I'm gonna punch him.
Punch.
500? Will that take care of it?
- BLEEP sucker just about run me into the rocks.
That's when you pray for the road to be closed up there
so you can yank him outta there and...
Yeah.
Looky here, the two BLEEP buses.
BLEEP!
The guy just hit me, boyo.
I'll knock his BLEEP teeth in and keep carrying on.
Oh, you're the guy drivin'.
I'm gonna extort this motherBLEEP.
It's what they do to us.
I want 500 rupees.
You hit my truck.
Why did you hit my truck?
Yah.
- Yeah, well, my truck's got the damage.
Yeah, my truck's got damage. His doesn't.
Whose ass do we need to kick?
BLEEP!
The guy just hit me, boyo.
In a small Himalayan village,
trucker Rick Yemm is looking for payback.
You hit my truck!
Why did you hit my truck?
Yah.
Whose ass do we need to kick?
That don't give him any reason to BLEEP hit you.
You were stopped.
What is it?
Hey.
The local driver runs to the village police official.
It don't matter if he was
on the wrong side of the road or not.
He run right into me.
- He was stopped, and you hit him.
There is misunderstanding.
- No, there was no misunderstanding.
He hit him.
If we hit him, he'd be wanting pay up.
- It's another impatient driver here hits me...
BLEEP does damage to my truck.
These BLEEP extort us white guys when we're here.
Every accident we've been in, we've had to BLEEP pay.
This guy BLEEP hits me,
and then he runs to the BLEEP cop,
and now it's all okay.
- You know, he goes runnin' to the cop,
so we basically had to let it go,
'cause we don't wanna get arrested
out here in the middle of nowhere.
There's no two-way street.
It's only one way, and it's their way.
After two days holed up in Keylong,
the North American truckers are making their way
over the Rohtang Pass.
- Just making our way up Rohtang here.
It's pretty stinkin' bumpy.
Pretty much one lane with snow here.
My goodness.
Pretty rough.
After two hours of climbing,
Rick and Dave catch up to Lisa.
- We are just steadily climbin' straight uphill.
Road seems to be gettin' uglier and uglier...
the closer to the top we get.
Rocks under the damn snow.
You know, I'm a little nervous goin' up this nasty-ass road
with that tire, but I still got Rick behind me
in case somethin' happens.
Well, we're up at the summit.
At 13,054 feet,
the Rohtang Pass began to form 70 million years ago
when the Indian subcontinent collided with Asia
and pushed up the Himalayas.
- All right, travelers, welcome to clusterBLEEP city.
This is the same traffic we got in on our way up.
We're stuck.
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
- Hey, Rick, I got a rock stuck between my duelies again.
You wanna show me that sweet little trick you got?
- Hey, girl, tie it to the rock, tie it to the bumper,
drive forward.
- Okay. Thanks.
Okay.
- Oh, don't do that. No, no, no, no!
He's gonna poke it with that stupid stick again.
No, no, no. We're not doing it that way.
We're not gonna do it that way.
We popped our tire last time.
I'm not sure exactly how to do this.
I've never done this before.
- I really think she needed to get that rock out
when we got out of the traffic jam, don't you?
- She's doing it right now? - Right now.
- Lisa Kelly is causing the traffic jam.
Tashi, I tied it up.
Come, come, come.
Stop here.
Did it work?
See if it worked.
Yes.
It worked.
Okay, all done.
- It worked, eh? Awesome.
When I first came here, Tashi was great
because I needed him to kind of get the feel
of the way things work.
"Keep horning?" - Yeah.
Slowly.
- Now I need to have my own time with just me and the truck
and really, really start learning.
Hey, we did it.
Back down. Next stop, Manali.
Hey, Rick, your trick worked.
I totally got the rock I was stuck on by myself.
It was great. - See?
Now, Tashi, you learned something too.
- Tashi, you listen to that little girl now.
Lisa, she's a hell of a truck driver,
but I worry about her like my little sister.
This year could get crazy awfully fast.
- Lisa, there's another Mexican standoff up here.
- Yeah, I've got somebody trying to get around me.
Wait, wait, wait.
Bye, ya sucka!
We're definitely on the last leg of the trip for sure.
These roads are really, like, tempting fate more.
I'm trying to keep a level head out here.
I just need to be more on my game,
so more practice, more learning, better driving.
Well, knock on wooden truck,
that tire of yours is holding up okay.
Yeah, so far, so good.
The road is just absolutely tore up, full of holes, dips.
I mean, just really nasty.
Sharp rocks.
Totally wrong road for me at the top.
Hmm.
You don't get any more ledgy than this.
It's real unnerving to get this tire on the edge,
because you are really sitting with your ass over the edge.
thud! BLEEP!
Golly! BLEEP!
At 1,100 feet above sea level...
thud! - BLEEP!
Golly! BLEEP!
Trucker Dave Redmon's just trying to get
down the mountain alive.
- I'm gonna get out and look and see what kind of damage I did.
What'd we clip?
It sounded like I tore the truck in half.
Oh, just nicked it.
Just nicked it too.
It sounds worse than it is,
'cause it's just so hollow and metal.
So just that little scrape just really sounds terrible.
Are we ready? - Okay.
- Let's get out of here, get to the bottom.
Well, we nipped one of those rocks that stick out at the top.
Oh, you nicked that one?
I was so close to that one too.
- Yeah, I think you're okay, though, Dave.
Yeah, we got it.
Yeah, we... we... we formed quite a pretty good team coming back.
You know, we're working together,
trying to get back down to Manali.
It's working out pretty good.
This guy.
- I'm just gonna piss this little BLEEP off for a while,
honking and BLEEP.
- Ah, he can wear that horn out all he wants.
- BLEEP you, you little BLEEP!
Break your head!
Don't need somebody to go that fast.
What'd he do to you?
- Well, he just run me right through the corner there.
- I'll stop this BLEEP right here.
Dave's BLEEPing with him.
Oh, and he ain't liking it either.
Oh, I know he's hating you right now.
- I got friends all over the world.
If he can sit back there and act civilized,
I might let him go by.
Oh, he's stopping.
He's stopping, Dave.
Dave's backing up.
Yeah, yeah, get out.
We're gonna go talk to this guy.
What's your problem?
- What's your BLEEP problem? You can BLEEP wait!
- You BLEEP, you're in such a hurry,
you gotta kill somebody, BLEEP?
Step the BLEEP out!
- Get out! - Step out!
- Get out! - You're a BLEEP BLEEP!
- Okay, okay. - Now, you go around!
You go around and get the BLEEP out of here!
Am I clear? - Okay.
- Go! - I'm sorry.
- Just getting sick of these BLEEP kids.
Now let's see him BLEEP with us again.
Guarantee it won't happen.
- No more of this, boyo, no more!
Ah!
- You know, at some point, you've just got to
tell these BLEEP to piss off.
- Maybe I'm overreacting a bit, but that guy took the wrath
for every BLEEP that pissed me off.
- You kick me enough, and I'm gonna bite you.
Dave.
Good old Davy boy there back up and he... BLEEP, he was stuck.
- Me and Rick are a team, you know?
He gets out; I get out.
You know, we can't just let anybody walk on us.
One of us gets pushed down, the other two step up.
End of conversation.
- No, we didn't end up killing anybody, me and Dave.
So Dave, he backed up, we boxed him in.
Oh, no way.
So somebody was, like, getting all on your case, huh,
and you got out?
- We both got out and reamed into him.
- Don't make one truck driver mad,
because they will all gang up on you,
and you will regret making a truck driver mad.
The day was challenging, but I overcame the challenges,
and... and it was a good day.
I had a very successful day, is how I'd grade it.
- The final piece of business today is, you know,
getting this tire taken care of.
I'm gonna leave this here overnight.
You mind if I jump in with you?
- Sure. - All right.
Yeah.
- Age before beauty. - Ah!
- Is this where the martinis are being served?
- Yes, sir. - Let's go.
Go, go, go.
Slow, slow, slow.
Go, go, go. That's what I'm used to.
- So I think we've both reached our wit's end
with guys cutting us off and...
Just acting stupid.
- It's quite the gratifying thing,
after all the time I spent over here
getting BLEEP with, that we get a little revenge.
Yep.
- That BLEEP sure changed his tune from being a tough guy.
- He probably had to get off at the next stop
and clean the BLEEP out of his underwear.
Yeah.
- This is one situation where you could bond with a guy
real BLEEP fast.
- Oh, yeah, you know, we've realized it,
and we gotta work together to get out of this
to get home safe.
Yeah, this could be an interesting little trip now.
- Oh, yeah, no, this is a whole new ballgame now.
- Whose ass are we gonna kick next?
I'm kicking ass and taking names and I'm fresh out of ink pens.
And Dave's next fight is with his spotter.
There's not enough room.
thud! Help, damn it!
And while Rick's sidelined...
- I've done my good deed in this country,
and I'm about ready to pack it in.
Lisa does the unthinkable.
- What I could do is go on this trip by myself.