Rescue by ‘Mog’

Storm, tornado, cyclone: 4WDs save the day

Where would we be if not for the 4WD vehicles that played such a pivotal role as floods and storms racked the country?

Nobody can deny the importance of wading/fording depth, a strong engine and robust four wheel drive when the weather turns nasty.

Electric vehicle advocates including those in Parliament sneer at diesel and petrol 4WDs, especially utes, as ‘inappropriate’. It is a safe bet none of those helped by 4WDs in the recent Kiwi ‘summer’ would agree.

Among the hordes of ‘civvie’ 4WDs helping out, there were some specialist trucks provided by New Zealand’s defence forces.

They included the mighty Mercedes Unimog.

Almost all Kiwi 4WDers know the Unimog.

The Universal-Motor-Gerät, more commonly known as the Unimog, is a high clearance 4WD vehicle, with massive wheels to cope with sand, mud, rocks and floods. It is a four tonne, 4WD truck used by our military for a wide range of roles including troop movement, fire-fighting, ambulances, stores carriage and as a gun tow vehicle.

Like the Jeep, the word Unimog is abused to describe all sorts of large all-terrain trucks.

They have been around a while. The first Unimog was developed under the direction of Albert Friedrich in 1948, for use in agriculture.

However, it was eventually bought by Mercedes-Benz and developed into the trucks, buses and lorries of today.

Unimogs deployed to help in areas hit by Cyclone Gabrielle are the U1700L (1976-88) model, which is seen by many as the classic Unimog.

They have four pedals – an accelerator, clutch and two brakes.

Sure! There are currently 220 Unimogs within the NZDF fleet. The NZDF has two models: the U1700 General Service and the U1300 Ambulance.

While most commonly associated with military uses, Unimogs are also used for logging, firefighting and as snowploughs, among other things.

They are often unaffected in flooded areas where their ride height – aided by the ‘Mog’s hub portal axles – mean they can operate in floodwaters of up to 1.2 metres

There are a number in private use too. In November 2017 the NZ Army sold 40 ‘Mogs. Two Unimogs up for disposal were donated by Ron Mark, the Minister of Defence at the time, to Northland in 2019.

Trucks for sale on TradeMe have descriptions ranging from “still very drivable” to “will not drive due to transmission issue”.