Courtesy of Brendan Cogbill
- The driver of a Ram 1500 TRX defied the odds in a video of the vehicle driving over mud.
- Amid rainstorms and flooding at Burning Man, the pickup truck managed to escape the muddy playa.
- Burners were warned to shelter in place as conditions worsened over the weekend.
Conditions at Burning Man 2023 were less than ideal as over 70,000 attendees continue to make their slow escape from the flooded and muddy terrain.
Weekend traffic updates warned Burners, as attendees are known, to avoid getting stuck in the mud by attempting to leave the arts festival-turned-disaster. While others trudged through ankle-deep mud at Burning Man, the driver of a truck made by Stellantis's Ram brand appeared to power through the wet grounds of Black Rock City, Nevada.
X user Brendan Cogbill posted a video of a yellow Ram 1500 TRX pulling an RV through the mud on Sunday amid a shelter-in-place order on the playa. The Burning Man festival was hit with rainstorm over the weekend that left more than 73,000 stranded.
I got this video yesterday of this TRX putting all that horsepower to good use to escape burning man😂 #burningman #BurningMan2023 pic.twitter.com/xWYriRgCHo
— Brendancogbill (@brendanmcogbill) September 4, 2023
Although festival account told Burners that only emergency vehicles were allowed to drive on the playa, videos surfaced of attendees trying to flee the soggy conditions on their own. Celebrities Diplo and Chris Rock hitched a ride out of Black Rock City with fans.
Cogbill told Insider he'd watched countless cars get stuck in the mud "not having any luck getting through" until the TRX came. He got video of the Ram making its way through the morass.
"Then we saw the TRX line up and it caught everyone's attention because you could just hear the supercharger whine in the distance with a big trailer, and he was making it look so easy," Cogbill said.
The video of the Ram 1500 TRX went viral for displaying the vehicle's ability to successfully make it across the soft mud that left thousands stranded.
In a follow-up post, Cogbill said the truck was driven by a renter, and the owner of the vehicle thought it "badass" to see the Ram make it out of such conditions only needing a car wash. Insider couldn't verify the driver of the truck.
Each year, Burning Man attracts over 70,000 attendees that include the average Silicon Valley tech bro, models, and billionaires. Google cofounder Sergey Brin was spotted this year amid the muddy chaos.