Ice Road Truckers' Alex Debogorski Knows Exactly Why The Show Is So Popular
"Ice Road Truckers" is one of History Channel's greatest hits, right alongside fictional dramas like "Vikings." Even the very first episode drew in a record-breaking audience of 3.4 million viewers (via HuffPost). For a documentary series about a relatively niche profession, these numbers can be considered surprising to many. On the other hand, "Ice Road Truckers" is a deep dive into an extremely dangerous line of work and the people who risk their lives to deliver necessary supplies to the most remote settlements on the planet. The sheer novelty of the show's setting and subject matter surely played a role in making viewers tune in every week for nearly 11 years.
The cast of memorable characters featured in the documentary series also contributed to the success of "Ice Road Truckers." Individuals like Lisa Kelly, Arthur Burke, and Alex Debogorski were responsible for some of the show's most iconic moments. In a Profiles interview, Debogorski expressed his own opinion on why "Ice Road Truckers" turned out to be so popular with audiences.
It's all about the scenery and characters
With decades of experience under his belt when "Ice Road Truckers" first came out, Alex Debogorski is a true veteran of his profession — and still an active truck driver. Moreover, no other trucker appeared in every single season of the series, except for Debogorski.
According to Debogorski, "Ice Road Truckers" gained such immense popularity for two major reasons. The first one is the setting. In an interview for Profiles in 2011, he explains that the documentary "shows an area of the world that many people are fascinated with, Northwest Territories is twice as big as Texas, we have 40,000 people, (...) there's very few people in this huge land, the animals, the sunsets, there's many interesting things about it." It's hard to disagree with him on this point, as the areas depicted in "Ice Road Truckers" are some of the very few places on Earth that remain hardly touched by human activity.
Secondly, the "Ice Road Truckers" star points to the importance of the characters chosen to be featured on the show, telling Profiles, "they choose a mix of people that attract [viewers] because of the interplay between us." The characters depicted on "Ice Road Truckers" are arguably the soul of the series. Driving on some of the most dangerous roads on Earth isn't how the majority of people would choose to earn their living. The History Channel documentary masterfully explores the drivers' motivations for doing so. Having featured in every season of "Ice Road Truckers," Debogorski is the trucker that viewers got to know the most in the entire cast, and he still posts about his trucking adventures on Instagram.