Get out and look ... then keep looking

I have a message for new drivers - the idea of Getting Out and Looking (GOAL) is important to you when you back up but what is as important is not depending on anyone to do your job of keep looking in your mirrors while you are backing up.

This week has been pretty boring for me, just doing truck moves and that's about it. BUT Tuesday I did almost all my heavy work thanks to GM being flooded and having to move their stuff out of there to a vendor for them to work.

While I was at their vendors getting unloaded, here comes a guy with s 53 foot trailer and a small day cab. We have trucks all over the place in the dock area (which is inside the building itself and has only a couple of those barrier or protection posts to help people not hit the building. This guy is in one BIG hurry to get into a dock to get loaded. He checks in at the shipping office where the girl tells him to wait until their trucks are moved and then he can back in. He decided not to wait when he got back into the cab. He pulls up into a tight spot between the equipment shed and the fence, snaked around to get clear of the first truck, then my truck (which wasn't going to move except for God telling me to move) and then cleared the last truck. He got out and looked, then looked at us (three if us drivers were standing there watching all of this) as if to tell us to guide him into the dock - something we don't do because that's the policy at this place. He had a clear shot just moving a little bit to the right but for some reason swung the rear of the trailer far to the left while he was only looking out his right mirror, never checked his left mirror. IF he would have checked his left mirror, he would have seen he wasn't going into the dock but into the building. So as we stand there watching this, we hear the forklift driver off to the side yelling at the guy who isn't looking to his left while his trailer is taking out 5 feet of the building. Now you would think the guy got a clue if he looked into his left mirror but he didn't even look even after he couldn't move the truck any more - he thought he was hitting one of those barriers.

The thing we were taken back by was his temper and getting mad at us for not warning him about hitting the building. He acted as if this was our fault, the shipping girl got into his face about not listening to her instructions and told him not to move the truck for any reason.

He had no reason to be mad at us, he failed to look in his left mirror. It was his failure that got him into a big mess. His hurry was the reason for this failure to look around and keep watch of what he was doing. The docks at this place is closed for repairs because of the structural damage, it is surprising how much damage was done.

 

I wish I had my iPhone but it was left at the customer's shop - don't want to destroy it. It is on their CCTV system, they immediately pulled the segment with the incident.

The problem for us drivers who were watching is there was no way for us to stop him by using a horn, we were too far away from our cabs to get to the horn and his windows were up while the forklift driver didn't have a loud horn so ... I don't think he is working there any more.

I don't get why everyone is in such a hurry, there was another truck sitting there, he didn't check in but came up to us asking how long would it be before the mess is cleared up so he can get rid of "the junk on his truck" and we just all pointed to the dock manager who told him to come back later. The driver got mad at the dock manager and said something about not deliving it, that was a mistake because he was right on the phone with the company while the driver was walking back to his truck screaming at not the dispatcher or some supervisor but the owner of the company about this driver.

I don’t generally help because I don't want to be on the hook for something that the driver did but if it is difficult place to get into, I offer first than stand where they can see me. If someone else helps while I'm helping, I stop and tell the driver.

The policy at that place is no helping people into the dock - it is posted four or five places and the girls in the shipping office tells that to every driver. There is a drivers board with info on the company policies and such, on this is a large 11X8 print out of that event that the dock manager posted. Last year they had a driver who took out a bunch of finished stock that was stored next to the dock when he missed the signals from the person guiding him (which is another point I will touch on in a moment). The cost of that mess was almost $100k of hand crafted panels for a company in France and another $80k for the damage to the building, racks and other things.

I don't like others guiding me into a dock and most people, even those with good intentions don't know how to use hand signals or know where to stand. I get into the truck at one place and back it into their shop tpo do a crane load and I have two people trying to guide me as if I don't know how to drive. If I react to one guy's signals, I would end up running over the other. So I just ignore both of them them at that shop. It is like fork lift drivers, I use rigger's signals to guide them as I was taught when I worked with riggers, almost all of them don't know what a rigger is let alone know what the signals are. I got tired of handing out a hand signal guide and reverted back to yelling out commands because of the issue.