tonight's top story

something big was coming to town. real big. it's all that anyone could talk about for weeks. the radio gave daily updates about its arrival. and no it was not the president's caravan, a popular music group, or even a museum exhibit. it was a 1,300,000-pound generator headed for a new power plant under construction in St. Paul, Va. it had made its way all the way from Japan to Louisiana, then on to Knoxville where it began the last leg of its journey through the mountains of Virginia. it was bound for the new power plant via Route 58 from Cumberland Gap through Pennington Gap and then through our little town of Big Stone Gap. it was destined to make its 200 mile journey only from the hours of 8 pm to 5 am at a max speed of 10 mph. its size would take up an entire side of what everyone here calls "the four lane," which says to me that when this four-lane highway was first built in this area, it was a pretty big deal. and now they were going to block it with this 650-ton monstrosity. no wonder everyone was talking about it. well, that and this was wise county's news event of the summer. like you've probably already guessed, not much goes on around these parts.
when the day finally came for it to pass through Big Stone, we decided we had to see what all the hub-bub was about. we had heard that due to an overpass or bridge on the four lane, the giant generator was forced to pass through the main street of Big Stone Gap. we drove up around 6pm and people had already started to gather. lawn chairs, a tent set up with people selling food, musicians playing on the small stage in the park. they were turning it into a town event. police and firemen were posted along the main street blocking it from traffic and rigging a crane to lift the cabled stop-lights to a height that would allow the generator to pass. some even had to be taken down as you see above. as the evening wore on, more people began to gather and speak in hyperbole about the generator. i heard it took four hours for it to pass one house up near pennington. you know, 100 men walk along side it as it travels down the road. i heard this is just the first of four others. you know, it hasn't left pennington. it won't get here until after midnight. this last one was not an exaggeration. and so after soaking up the crowd, i returned home around 9pm.
the next morning, we got on the road to head to the clinic in Norton. the four-lane was partially blockaded with cones as we entered our on ramp with a gathering of equipment on the shoulder that said WIDE LOAD. is this it? no. it couldn't have only made it this far all night. it doesn't look big enough. once we got to the clinic, it was confirmed. that was the giant generator (that didn't look all that giant) and it had only made it a few miles outside of Big Stone after getting stuck for a few hours at two locations. on our way home that evening, it was still parked, causing a bit of a traffic jam as people pulled over to take photos. if you want to see the generator itself and hear more, check out this video from the local news.