A very slippery A50 caused problems on Friday morning. That is why Rijkswaterstaat has deployed ‘big artillery’ on the highway: the Lavastorm. “It’s just a beast of a car. We use it in more extreme weather to combat ice shelves,” says Rijkswaterstaat.
It is the only lava storm that Rijkswaterstaat has. The vehicle was specially designed for them and is the only one in the world. The Lavastorm has a 440 hp diesel engine, twelve wheels and can hold 15,000 liters of brine.
The vehicle has a heavy snow plow at the front and a… high speed roller broom that makes about 960 revolutions per minute. The brush rotates so fast that ice sheets are destroyed. The rear of the car then does the rest.
“Every ice sheet is guaranteed to die.”
At the back of the car, brine water is heated to ninety degrees. This is then sprayed onto the road surface at high pressure by eighty nozzles. About 130 liters per minute. “Every ice sheet is guaranteed to be damaged,” says the spokesperson for Rijkswaterstaat.
Because there is only one copy, the Lavastorm is used strategically. Depending on the weather forecast, the Lava Storm is placed where the most inconvenience is expected.
The car has a smaller brother, the Firestorm. This variant is a bit smaller and the brine water that is sprayed out is a bit less hot: sixty degrees. Rijkswaterstaat has two of these smaller copies.
Rijkswaterstaat previously showed how the Lava storm clears the road of ice:
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