Cómo subieron una excavadora sin rampas

What does “hacer palanca” mean in Spanish?

Hacer palanca means to use leverage — pushing or prying against a fixed point to move something far heavier than you could lift directly. A palanca is a lever, so hacer palanca is literally “to make lever.” Two workers use exactly this trick to load a digger onto a truck with no ramps: they pivot its front wheels against the truck bed, then lever the machine forward with its own hydraulic arm.

The word’s roots go back to Greek phálanx (a log or roller used to move heavy loads) by way of Latin phalanga — remarkably literal after two thousand years. It branches into everyday use too: tener palanca means to have “pull” — connections or influence that get things done — and apalancamiento is the finance term for leverage, borrowing to move more money than you actually have.