Picture: Digging in for the wrong reason

Picture / Greg Bowker

Two diggers stuck in the thick of it were eventually hauled back to dry land after a mammoth effort to free them in Auckland's CBD yesterday.

Che Bartle, of Ace Heavy Haulage, said the first of the 70-tonne diggers got stuck when the platform it was working on gave way at a building site on the corners of Mahuhu Cres and Tapora St, near the container wharf. A second digger called to the site to help free it then slipped about 12m to end right next to the trapped digger.

Mr Bartle said an Ekebol recovery truck, "probably the biggest truck in Auckland", was used to free the diggers, taking more than seven hours. "You can look back and laugh now but, at the time, you just wanted to rip your hair out," he said.