Finally, otr with my trainer...

gravdigr · Jun 29, 2011

another 2-5 weeks depending on how fast I learn. I'm thinking I should be done in 3-4 weeks total.

Ok, so my trainer drives bobtail to pick up the new trailer, and it's more like 125mi. He has me in the sleeper to go ahead and get my 10 hours out of the way. I wake up, 10 hours is done and we are waiting for dispatch. They had asked if there was an empty trailer i the yard we can hook to, we say yes and they say hook up we got you a load. We find a nice trailer and hook up. The trailer is full of sawdust and the trainer is sweeping it out while I am getting dressed (I had just woken up at this point). While he is in the trailer the qualcom chirps and I check the load assignment and think it must be a mistake because it is exactly like our last load assignment, bobtail to yard, grab brand new trailer and bring it back. I check the trailer number and it is indeed a new load assignment. Needless to say the trainer is fuming at this point after finding, hooking, and sweeping a trailer only to have to unhook and leave it to bobtail and get another trailer.

He's getting close to the end of his 14 so he runs us a few miles to the TA and we stop for a bite to eat then he has me bobtail the rest of the way to the yard to pick up the new trailer and bring it back.

Now here's my question, why does dispatch send me on a 125mi run to pick up a trailer when that yard was closed before dispatch even send the #### load assignment? TYVFM for now screwing up my 14 since the yard doesn't open for another 7 ####### hours. I'm so glad I had 2 cups of coffee plus another 20oz coffee on the road so I can spend 8 hours in the sleeper WIDE AWAKE to extend my 14. Night dispatch sucks balls and I hope you get crabs you dirty rotten....arrrrrrggggg!!!

gravdigr · Jun 29, 2011

On a lighter note, a few things I am thankful for...

Cute girls

large boobs

tank tops

convertables

Specially when the 4 are combined

gravdigr · Jun 29, 2011

ok, more folly is coming....

It seems that we should have never been dispatched to pick up that second trailer because the yard was closed. We had a load waiting for us, a hot load. Unfortunately the 2nd shift dispatcher is......"special". So not knowing we had this load waiting for us we are sitting at the wrong yard waiting for it to open and pick up this trailer when at 6am we had a loaded trailer ready for us to take to Orlando. And it has to be there by 6am friday...that's about 2,600 real miles. No friggin way. And to make matters worse when we picked up the trailer we noticed a pretty nasty split in the one drive tire. We are still sitting in line at the TA in Ontario, CA (that's california, not canada) waiting for it to be repaired. They pretty much extended our deadline to midnight fri. Still gonna have to boot scoot but we should make it.

Rerun8963 · Jun 29, 2011

enjoy that T/A while you are there. many years ago it was a 76...and not too nice a place either...

Yatista · Jun 30, 2011

Rerun8963 said: ↑

enjoy that T/A while you are there. many years ago it was a 76...and not too nice a place either...
Click to expand...

Still not a nice place to stay, but, its only $12.00 a night.

gravdigr · Jun 30, 2011

The following is a direct copy and paste from a post I made on my facebook page detailing the experience I had today. It is written geared towards non drivers so I will be explaining some things you folks already know. I'm going to repost this in the section for questions to truckers from the general public in hopes to educate them a little, at the very lease scare the crap outta them.

I have been chewing it over in my mind all day and been too busy to really express it.

The day started out for me at 12:30am my time (my time is central time, the time I use to fill out my log book). As I'm driving I come across an electronic information sign noting that there is a crash 72 miles ahead and to expect delays. Incidentally I am travelling on I10 eastbound towards phoenix, az.

I'm making good time. My mileage is good enough that the governor on my truck allows me to run the max allowable speed for my truck which is 65mph, the speed limit is 75 mph. I pass a schneider truck and another white tractor trailer and pull back over to the right lane in front ofr them.

A little over an hour after passing the warning about the accident I see the flashing lights of a patrol car. As I go past I see he has no one pulled over. I become alert and slow down putting my 4 way flashers on as I was taught. The police cruiser is a sign we are coming up to backed up traffic from the accident.

We come to the traffic and it is totally stopped, cb chatter says there is a tractor trailer overturned and on fire (there was also a passenger car involved but I didn't know that at the time.) Phil, my trainer is sleeping in the bunk and I pout the truck in neiutral, set the brakes and turn off the headlights leaving the marker lights on. preparing for a long boring rest and some entertaining cb chatter.

I look over at my passenger side mirror and see the 2 trucks I passed pulling over to the burm behind me and a lot of people walking around. I have been told at accidents when traffic will be backed up for hours that drivers will often pull out lawn chairs and sit out in the road ############. So I figure I will step outside and stretch and join the weenie roast (I will regret the weenie roast thought later when I learn about the accident in front of us).

As I start walking back I immediately see something is wrong. Headlights are blinding me but I can see reflections of broken glass on the highway. Looks like someone had a fender bender.

I couldn't have been more wrong.

What I walk up on was so horrifying I am still trying to process it. First responders are trained to see this kind of thing, I was not. I will try to describe what I saw as I believe it happened given the witness comments and evidence at the scene.

Remember when I said I passed those 2 trucks? Well before them I had passed a white fullsize van towing a car lugging up the hill. Aparrently what happened was the schneider truck I passed Had come to a stop on the highway because of the backed up traffic. He had his 4 way flashers on and had set his parking brake. From what I can tell the van was probably travelling at least the full speed limit of 75mph having picked up momentum coming down the hill. He was either distracted (cell phone?) or dozed off because he never touched his brakes or tried to swerve as he slammed into the back of the fully loaded schneider truck (driver said he was just under 79k lbs). The van hit the truck so hard that, even with the truck brakes set, it pushed the truck 5' forward into the trailer in front of him.

The schneider driver pulled forward as the van had folded the dot bumper (that metal bumper than hangs down from the back of the trailer) all the way up under the trailer and the van was under the trailer.

As I walked up to the van I saw the engine compartment looked like it had exploded with debris scattered everywhere. The windshield was spiderwebbed all over and you could not see through it. I asked a bystander if anyone checked on the driver/passengers. They showed me you could see through a crack where the windshield separated from the A pillar on the driver side. Through the crack you could just see a bit of the drivers head, his face was buried in the airbag, and his hand still on the steering wheel. We tried yelling at his but he was totally unresponsive. I now believe at this point he was dead.

I moved around to the passenger side and this is where it got very scary...this is where I got the shakes that would not go away for a good 3 hours. The passenger side door had blown off. What I could see was all the cargo in the back of the van was now where the front seat should have been. We were looking for any signs of passengers. We find it. Where the door was attached to the van we see a crack and in that crack we see what is obviously long dark hair belonging to a female. We start calling though I cannot imagine we will get a reply, she would be stuffed in the footwell under the dash....we get a reply that will stick with me forever. Screaming. Hysterical, confused, terrified female screaming muffled from all the debris on top of her. It scared the everloving #### out of me. She just kept screaming. Then mercifully it stopped for a few seconds. Then this time the screams came again but this time they were for help. Oddly that relieved me.

Then the helplessness....what do we do? There are no police or emergency services. This poor woman is trapped in pain, confused and obvoiusly scared out of her mind. But I had been trained, when coming upon an accident with victims you do not move the victims or disturb the scene unless the victim is in imminent danger, like from a fire. There was no imminent danger here, no fire. I know in my mind we did the right thing waiting but that little voice in my head keeps asking "why didn't you do something, what if that was your family in there?".

Almost 20 minutes after first arriving on the scene finally we see a patrol car coming. Then the police do what we could have already done. They start pulling all the stuff out of the van. Those of us nearby help by clearing the debris out of their way as they pitch it out of the van. I am shocked to see them pitch what looks like a 5' long air tank from an upright air compressor out of the van. Those things are heavy and can do some damage in an accident.

After the debris is cleared out of the van I get another shocker. This van had a wire mesh divider between the cargo area and the front passenger area. This steel divider was wedged up against the dash. I hear the police talking to the woman, I can just see the top of her head and her forearm and hand sticking out. She has one of those blue rubber wristbands on her wrist people love to wear....then I hear the officer say "11 year old boy". Good god, where was he? I would never find out. The rescue finally came with the jaws of life to begin cutting the woman out and the police cordon off the area and we are moved back. We watch from a distance and finally see them remove the woman. Then my heart sinks as I see the rescue workers stay with the woman rather than return to the van. The boy and his father are dead. As lifeflight comes for the poor lady I turn around and walk back to my truck.

On my way back I see the driver of the schneider truck sitting in his cab and I stop to talk to him. He is an older gentleman and I feel bad for him. He did everything right, but I know in his mind he is hurting. His last words were "I hope they are ok". He either doesn't know or is in total denial that 2 people are dead and I'll be suprised if the woman makes it. Now this driver will be subjected to a drug and breathalyzer test, his truck will be picked apart by dot officers looking for any fault or defect, he will be put out of service pending a full investigation. You see when there is an accident involving a commercialo vehicle resulting in a fatality fault is often put on the cmv driver even when it was obviously the 4 wheeler drivers fault. This guys life will become a living hell because of a momentary lapse of someone he doesn't even know.

My mind is reeling as I finish walking back to my truck. Let me explain something about how the governor in ym truck works. When I first start on the road my governor limits me to 60 mph. Once the computer sees we are acheiving an acceptable fuel mileage it will step up to 63mph, then aqgain to 65 MPH. Remember when I said I passed those 2 trucks? I was doing 65 mph and just passed them. They were governed slower than I was. Had I not acheived the full 65mph on my governor I would have stayed behind the schneider truck, and it would have been MY trailer the van hit. I literally stopped in my tracks. How narrow a margin I had escaped tragedy. The thought still gives me goosebumps.

I got back in my truck and woke Phil my trainer up to fill him in and we talked for a bit.

I am now in the sleeper to get my required 10 hours rest while he drives. I am going to try and get some sleep and hope I can stop hearing that poor woman screaming in my mind.

P.S. Please all you 4 wheeler drivers out there take a lesson from this. At 55mph a vehicls travels 81 feet in one second. At 75 mph it travels 110 feet. Looking away for just 3 seconds at 75mph your vehicle will cover the distance of a football field and then some. PAY attention to what is going on around you. You have no idea how fast you can come up on a stopped vehicle. Let me ask you something. Take a guess how long the white painted lines are on the highway, and how much distance there is between them. I bet you will be wrong.

Those lines whizzing past are 12' long, with a 24' gap between them.

Incidentally I forgot to mention. The accident that started this whole mess was a car vs another tractor trailer. They caught fire. Bystanders managed to remove 3 family members from the car but it became fully engulfed before they could remove the grandmother. They had to watch her burn. Regretting my weenie roast comment when I learned this. As we finally drove past the scene the truck and trailer were completely disintegrated. The debris left could nfit in the bed of a pickup truck.
Click to expand...

mattp · Jun 30, 2011

#### thats crazy i hope she makes it but most of all i hope you are able to make it i was an emt its not easy still go to bed and have nightmares just something thats impossible to get over especially after escaping that situation of that could of been you

Freebird135 · Jul 1, 2011

i aint even been out here that long and ive already seen some pretty wicked wrecks.....when you are on the road 10-12 hours a day the probability of witnessing wrecks and other events goes up

gravdigr · Jul 1, 2011

I'm good now. You can check my other thread in the questions for drivers from the general public I made a post there about how I recovered my sanity and gained a new outlook on life.

Krooser · Jul 1, 2011

Rerun8963 said: ↑

enjoy that T/A while you are there. many years ago it was a 76...and not too nice a place either...
Click to expand...

We had some awesome parties there in the 70's... kinda like 'run what ya brung' but with beer and women...

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