Great reason to stay away from crst!!!

Easy one, they were wrong and are now trying to limit their liability. You can't just "go" 5 or 10mph in the traveled lane of the highway. D.B. will have to give you the charges typical to this situation.

Q: What idiot would roll along at 5 mph on the interstate? For any reason? There are none ! If ur lost...pull over! Same for breakdown!

I guess they will never learn ! Throwing warm bodies behind the wheel trying to cover freight will never work. Odds are way against you, pay the money and hire a pro! Freight too cheap to pay a pro? Lay off the fat boy middle managers and can the 20 year olds in short skirts running around the office. This is trucking, not Vegas! There isn't any money for that !

Ugh!!

 

ya know so many people want to fry the trainer. When I was with Werner we had to accomplish a certain amount of time before we could drive between midnight and 6 am. I believe it was 2-3 weeks. How is this the trainers fault except for misjudging that the student was capable to handle the truck and trailer in these types of circumstances. Obviously the student was tired and exercised poor judgment by remaining on the road......that is what I am getting from his story.....we've all felt a bit of disorientation when we are driving tired...and before you break out your pitchforks and try to burn me at the stake.....think about it honestly.
The other thing we have to wonder about is what was the driver that hit CRST doing? He couldn't judge that there was a problem due to the hazard lights?? He couldn't see them...we'll never know because the man is dead, condolences to his family....but there is more to this than just a poorly trained student and a sleeping trainer.

 

I posted this in another thread about the same issue. I'm sorry, but this is what I think about the incident.

 

Hmmm seems idiots abound around this one....... one commentator writes " he is surprised the trooper blamed the CRST truck" What???????!!!!!!

Another says " The trainer was asleep"...... So? It's a team operation, not driving school !

Ugh!! Go home , rookies!

 

I had a situation like this happen to me when I was a trainer at Werner. Had a student slip a gear getting onto the interstate and he flat out panicked. Leaned on the stick so hard that I couldnt pull him out to move it to the right gear for him. all the while rolling to a stop in the interstate with me the whole time saying you need to pull over, the fotrh time I screamed at him pull the ##### truck over which got through his paniced state and he complied. Luckily we were in a deserted spot and didnt get hit but it was a hell of an experiance. I ended up getting suspended from training because of that guy. But the dude wasnt a truck driver anyway and they did end up getting rid of him.

 

No loss Pete....... I've taught many from my kids to new hires. My fortune has been the new hires were pre-screened for experience and road tested because of the nature of our business. ( chemicals ) I didn't get all green....you actually had something to work with.

I can see this..... trainer feels "he did his time" , the long nights, the low pay....why not become a trainer and get that extra cash and get to sleep at night ? "Let the kid do the line haul" "What trouble can he get in running between cities?"

It's a shame...and I feel for the family. Trainer gets the brunt my of anger but CRST gets half for letting the rookie behind the wheel. Carriers have got to raise the bar !

Perhaps CSA 2010 will do this for us.......

 

This adds a bit different aspect to the storyline.


Levester Phillips wrote on Mar 26, 2011 11:06 AM: " I saw the accident, and called 911. it was only the 3 of us out there. i passed the FCC driver, drove about a 1/4 mile, and passed the CRST truck.
The CRST driver had his hazzard lights on, and barely moving. I grabbed my CB mic to see if he needed help. when i looked in my right mirror at him..i saw the explosion from the empact!! Honestly, the FCC driver had time to avoid the CRST truck. There was no traffic out there. I was doing 74mph, and could'nt stop close enough to help. LP "

Sounds like the FCC driver should of had time to avoid the CRST truck from this account.

 

It all boils down to the quality of training and proper supervision until a driver can be left on his own. You can't base a students learning level on time as each student is different in how fast they absorb instruction.

CRST is known for their puppy mill operation and poor quality of training. Any student should be taught to wake the trainer up in case of any problems. The student not aware of still having positive throttle left indicates he wasn't ready to be unsupervised. If he is missing gears and unable to recover, he is not ready to be unsupervised. How are these students passing their road test? The trainer made a poor decision of hitting the sleeper. A student has a hard enough time learning to be put in the position of combatting late night driving also. But hey, get the trainee to do the dirty work and get that bigger paycheck. Being a good trainer is not an easy job.

On the other hand, you see flashers ahead should put you on alert. You should be moving over to the hammer lane regardless. A mile away you should be able to recognize you are gaining on traffic. The witness made it safely around CRST.

I think all three could of done things differently as all involved made poor decisions, including CRST. 2am played a part most likely as all were sleepy. CRST will be held liable mainly because of the driving below minimum speed.

It's sad another driver needlessly lost his life. And reading the comments from some friends and family members amplifies it. RIP driver and I hope the family can find closure.

BigBlue, I can understand your situation. But I would communicate with the driver before hand. If you miss a gear, do not panick, I will step in and help you..... this is how we'll handle it....
Schools should do a better job identifying problem students before sending them out. It's not the trainers responsibilty to teach the impossible. I'm not a trainer nor would I be. But if I was, I would incorporate teaching how to recover from a missed gear. It's a common problem of new drivers and should be included in classroom training. The way it is now, it's an uncovered topic, everyone panicks because they are not prepared to deal with it. In your case, the student vapor locked and when you couldn't fix the situation, you had to resort to screaming. Maybe during the road test, the one evaluating the student should knock the truck out of gear and see how the student recovers??