From runway to freeway

The driver tossed a clipboard onto the dash of the tow truck, hopped inside and turned the ignition. The hood of the blue truck displayed a Superman logo. The driver, Mike Setze, 37, wore a navy-blue jumpsuit with neon-orange stripes. On this particular snowy Saturday morning, his 12-hour shift at Chad’s Towing and Recovery Wrecker Company had just begun.

During his shift at Chad’s,   spends most of his time driving from one tow to the next. On busy days, particularly on days with inclement weather, he is often too busy to stop for a lunch break.

The day prior, when a sheet of white snow began cumulating on the ground, four tow truck drivers completed 76 runs, two times more than an average day. So far this January, Chad’s manager, Brian Sample, said his drivers have completed approximately 900 runs. This number is higher than in warmer months, Sample said, but with this year’s milder winter, business has not decreased.

Since he started his job at Chad’s seven months ago, this January has been his busiest month yet, Setze said.

For him, though, business is good. With paid commission for each job, busier days allow for a larger paycheck. Plus, driving a tow truck allows him to help other people.

“Most people are just happy someone is coming to help them out,” Setze said. “Yesterday, they were just happy to get out of the cold.”

However, Setze dreams for something a little different. Something he once had.
Willing to accept a pay cut, Setze hopes to one day rebuild his career as a pilot.

Setze became a flight instructor at Vincennes University in Vincennes, Ind. upon graduation from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, Fla. in 1999.

Setze was hired by the Indiana University Foundation in 2000 after instructing flight students for a year.

While with IU, Setze flew turbo-prop airplanes, transporting the University’s athletes and high-ranking employees across the country.

But when the University sold its planes in 2006, Setze lost his job.

Setze’s wife of eight years owns her own hair salon. Because of this, among other reasons, Setze was unwilling to relocate to find a new flying job.

Working briefly in the auction business, Setze was eventually hired by Chad’s.

“Brian figured if I could fly a plane, I could handle a tow truck,” Setze said.

Although Setze said Bloomington’s scenery is prettier from the air, he said driving a tow truck is similar to flying a plane.

“It’s all just transportation,” Setze said. “It’s similar in that respect, getting people from Point A to Point B.”

Both as a pilot and tow truck driver, Setze said he has appreciated his ability to roam.

“It’s why I wanted to fly,” Setze said. “I’ve never wanted to sit in a cubicle. I’d go crazy.”

But for now, Setze shifted the diesel engine into gear and pulled away, leaving a pack of cigarettes and a Styrofoam cup half-full of coffee in the shop.

As instructed by Chad’s dispatcher, he was off to pick up his first vehicle of the day.

Driving the tall wrecker through town, Setze gazed down on the surrounding traffic.

Following a GPS unit mounted to the top of the windshield, Setze approached his destination — Landmark Collision Repair Center.

Pulling into the repair center, Setze halted his rig in the middle of the parking lot.

Facing toward the tow truck, a middle-aged man and woman sat in a white PT Cruiser. Exiting his truck, Setze walked toward the PT Cruiser, and the woman stepped outside.

Setze was not there to retrieve the PT Cruiser. Rather, he was there for a blue Ford F-150 pickup parked in a row of other vehicles.

The F-150, Setze said, had recently been in an accident. The woman in the PT Cruiser, who owns the truck, scheduled for Landmark to repair its body damage. But before body repairs could be made on the truck, Setze said the owners needed to fix damages to the truck’s brakes.

Because Landmark was unable to do the repairs, Setze was instructed to transport the vehicle to where the woman’s husband works: A waste removal business. From there, the woman’s husband planned to fix the vehicle on his own.

But almost immediately, however, the woman presented Setze with a problem.

She did not know where to find the truck’s keys.

Setze waited patiently as the woman used her cell phone to call Landmark, hoping someone on the other end could solve their problem.

Nobody inside the garage answered.

“Can you tow it without the keys?” the woman asked.

“Not very well,” Setze replied.

But then, a Landmark employee approached Setze’s tow truck, rolling the window on his turquoise car down halfway.

“The key is in the gas door,” the man said.

“Found it,” Setze replied a few seconds later.

Similar scenarios are common, Setze said. He frequently waits for people as they search for their vehicle’s keys.

Finally, Setze was ready to tow the pickup. Both the PT Cruiser and turquoise car pulled away from the parking lot as Setze lined the back of his tow truck up to the front of the F-150.

Setze slipped on a pair of oil-stained gloves and lowered his tow truck’s ramp onto the ice-covered asphalt.

Two hooks latched chains to the front of the F-150.  Pulling a red-handled lever on the side of his tow truck, the Ford crept forward.

After securing the truck with chains around the back wheels, Setze jumped back into the heated cab of his tow truck and drove off the parking lot into Bloomington’s mild traffic.

Arriving at K&S Rolloff, the waste removal business, Setze backed up next to a cluster of large, empty green dumpsters. Stepping into the cold, he lowered the F-150 back onto the ground.

His first tow of the day was complete.

His next stop was at the Delta Zeta house, where he was instructed to seek out a black Volkswagen.  

Pulling into the sorority’s parking lot, Setze immediately pointed out the Volkswagen, which had its hood propped open.

The Volkswagen, which Setze said was only three weeks old, likely did not need a tow. The owner, a female IU student who arrived to the vehicle’s location with her father, believed the car only required a jump-start. But Setze arrived in a tow truck, just in case.

After hooking a blue jump-start pack to the Volkswagen’s battery, the woman turned the key in her ignition, and the engine fired immediately.

With only a dead battery, the car did not need a tow.

“Thank you,” the woman said as Setze walked away from the Volkswagen, back into his tow truck.

Without another immediate job, Setze drove his tow truck back to the garage. But to get there, he took the long route downtown, just in case he was dispatched to another vehicle needing a tow. Without receiving an immediate call, Setze arrived at Chad’s and brought his wrecker to a halt.

“Now to find a cup of coffee and wait for the buzzer to go off in the office again,” Setze said as he crawled out of the driver’s side door.

Grabbing his Styrofoam cup, Setze walked into an office toward a table cluttered with potato chips, Diet Coke and two coffee pots sitting side by side.

Temporarily away from the cold, Setze poured himself a cup of hot coffee. From there, Setze waited to help the next person in need.