Swift - Starting the New Year training with Swift 1/7/13 - A long read...

Still here driving with Swift.

I'm currently at the Pilot in Morgantown, WV. I like WV. Beautiful state. Hilly and interesting when you have 43,000 in the box.


My wifi hotspot through Boost Mobile sucks so I have been buying Pilot's $20/month wifi. I'm here often enough and I have the shower credits.



I have my complaints about Swift but since I don't have a frame of reference to compare them to, I'm not sure what to say.

Since my last post I got my trailer stuck in a ditch in Georgia when I was delivering to my final after driving up from Miami. I was a little tired (danger!) and thought the ground was solid on the sides of the driveway. The road I was coming off of was a tight little one way in each direction country road. GPS was telling me to go 1/2 mile down the road to the left. I saw the road it was directing me to and thought "no way". I looked to my right and noticed a sign set back from the street stating the name of the consignee. I hadn't set my turn up to make the right but it didn't look too bad. I made the right. Trailer tandem on the passenger side dropped off and, boom, stuck in a ditch. There was, in retrospect, an easier way into the place but I blindly and ignorantly followed the sign for "truck entrance" and there she went. I was watching my front end to make sure I was clearing the entrance sign and intermittently watching the passenger rear as I made the right turn. It appeared to be solid ground on both sides of the entrance, it looked like some grass. I was wrong. The whole little town came out to view my grief. Some offered, in jest, to push me out. I waited in embarassment, my front curtains closed on my side to hide my face, as the wrecker came. He arrived, then decided he needed to call the police to block traffic to get my trailer out. Two sheriff deputies came out. They decided they weren't sure whether it required an accident report so they called the state police. My truck and trailer were completely on the consignees private property. State cop came out, took my info and wrote up an accident report. He stated I wouldn't be ticketed. All I wanted at this point was to get this thing unloaded and sleep. It was about 11 AM at this point and I had been driving since the night before. Not a great day. Spent the next 10, after unloading, taking pics of the undamaged truck and trailer, getting statements from the business owner who had managed to laugh at my follies and take pictures for posterity, I cleared the dock and parked there near the Vidalia onion fields. Redeeming place to be although the whole thing sucked. I did get up that evening to do a pretrip inspection and spent a little extra time listening to the frogs in the distance, staring up at the crystal clear star-filled sky and noticed the moon's reflection on the onion fields. I could smell them. It was dark and cooler and I was kind of happy for that moment. Somewhat redeeming although not entirely.

I got a couple of Swift points when a car driver decided to come out of nowhere and take the space I was moving into when I was changing lanes. He didn't like that I was where he wanted to be. He harassed me down the highway shaking his fist, giving me the finger and waving his phone at me. I backed off and ignored him. He got off the highway and I thought the whole thing was over. It wasn't. A few minutes later, looking in my drivers side rear view I observed someone tailgating me very close. They went to pass me on my left, honking, giving me the finger and then cutting me off. He was back. I called 911. He had tailgated me and called the 1-800 "How's my driving" number. I found out when I got to the shipper, via a phone call from my driver manager, that he had called the 800 number. As a result, I got some Swift points despite me disagreeing with his statements. Nothing I could do about that except submit my appeal, which will do nothing.

I've been running around the East Coast since I have had my last 2 hometimes out here. Don't know if I mentioned it before but I prefer to drive out west, the midwest or the south. I really don't like driving out here due to the small, older roads and the lack of truck parking after 6:00 PM. I get stressed just thinking I need to shut down after 6:00 PM out here, to the point where I have altered my delivery schedule so that I can park earlier.


So what I have learned that so much of this job (lifestyle) is trial by fire. No doubt. I make mistakes all the time I just do my best to learn from them and not repeat them.



I had an incident at Walmart in Carlisle, PA recently. I tried to find parking at some truck stops and rest areas on my way 81 and 76 heading west. No luck. I called the Carlisle Wal-Mart and asked it it was ok if I parked there. They asked me if I was shopping and I said I would be. They said it was ok. I found the place and there were no other trucks parked there. No RVs. That was hint #1. I parked and went inside to return a tv and get a new one. Shopped for a while and came out to a parking ticket on my window. I called the police department and complained. I was told that Wal-Mart only leased the property and didn't have authority to allow me to park there. The property owner did not allow trucks there. The dispatcher got tired of my complaining and hung up on me. I had a feeling that a police officer would be out to visit me soon. I was half joking and fully correct. Within 10 minutes a police SUV showed up. He was not pleasant. He threatened to have me towed, a level 3 inspection (as he stated he was DOT inspection certified) and to get some kind of special tickets that would go on my CSA record. I explained to him that I was given permission to park there and he repeated what the dispatcher stated to me. I calmed him down. He wanted me to drive off the property but I was already in my sleeper status. I explained this to him and he called Onroad to come out and tow me to a truckstop. I called Swift and spoke to them at the corporate office as my terminal was closed at this time. Tow truck came out, spent a few hours hooking me up, towing me and unhooking. By the time I went to sleep I was 6 hours into my sleeper status. I paid the $15 parking fee and put it in the mail the next morning at the Pilot where I was parked. Sucky situation and I learned my lesson.


One more hard lesson for a new driver. I still love driving. I've realized I'm happiest when I'm doing just that, driving. I love the challenges I face everyday in this position, I love the solitude of going to sleep everynight in my little truck nest in the back watching some movies (I've accumulated about 100 at this point!) and I love seeing the places I see. It's a unique life style. I enjoy talking to all the different people from all over the U.S. that I encounter. They give more color to an otherwise already colorful existence. What I don't like as much is the other aspects of this life such as the administrative tasks and dealing with some shippers and consignees. I understand though that this is part of the job. Recently I was told to pick up a load in Cincinnati. I refused it at first due to the time constraints and not being able to meet them. I was assured that the load was ready for me at the dock (it was a live load) and all I needed to do was show up and get loaded. Nope. 6.5 hours later I was finally loaded and parked across the street taking my 10. Funny how this works out because I ended up talking to another cool driver that was waiting and the whole situation went from "this freakin sucks!" to "well, it is what it is". Same load and I'm heading up to Chicago to drop it. Rush, rush, rush I was told. Send a late call if you are late. Etc. etc. etc. I rush up to Chicago from the Cincinnati, fight Chicago traffic, make my way through the tight west side of the city only to get to the consignee whom had been closed for hours. No one messages me. No one lets me know even though I had been in contact with dispatch all day. Now I'm on a tiny street on the west side of Chicago. I can't go straight because the Metro train tressel is too low. I can't turn around because all of the docks are filled with trailers. The only way out was to back down this street with cars, pedestrians and everything else so I could make my way back to some main streets and the highway. Fought traffic back south through Chicago and spent the night at the Gary T/A. The next day I was at the Gary terminal. It was just one of those loads....

I have noticed that driving and the whole shipping/receiving process is easier out on the West Coast. Everything seems more relaxed. I never knew I hated driving in Jersey so much before this job, since I did grow up there after all.

It's all a learning process so I look forward to what comes tomorrow.

I'm heading back out near Carlisle, PA tomorrow to drop. Not going to park at any Walmarts.

Until next time...

 

Thanks Shamrock. Hope all is well with you.

 

Ha ha, that is too funny. I can't believe there is even a thread about it. I'm going to read that one.

It was a crazy incident all around...

 

Unreal. Going to check this out.

This is true. But from a business perspective I can also see Walmart's position and that of the property owner. Our trucks take up a lot of parking space and only some of us actually spend some money there. Considering the labor in cleaning up some of the garbage left behind, damage to the property resulting in higher insurance premiums, etc. it's probably not the most fiscally responsible move to allow us to stay there.

But I do agree that we spend money there and we also deliver their goods. If it wasn't for us truckers Wal-mart would be out of business unless they found a way to run a rail line right up to every store. That goes for most of the businesses in this country although I don't think it is recognized by the non-trucking public very often.

I agree 100%. I get pissed off thinking that there are a few slobs out there that ruin it for all of us. Just thinking of what happened that night back in Pennsylvania made me more pissed at those drivers before me that ruined it.

That guy towing my rig explained to me that a week prior a trucker had entered that same lot and knocked down a light pole onto his trailer resulting in the trailer and rig being towed out and the damage to the property.

If we didn't buy fuel at the Pilots, the Loves, the other places I don't think they would allow us to stay based on cigarette, soda and fast food sales. It just wouldn't make sense. I pulled bobtail into a Pilot earlier today to do my mandatory 30 minute break. There was an open dumpster no more than 15 feet away and there sat a bottle of piss on the ground. How lazy can you be to just leave a bottle of piss in the parking lot so close to a dumpster?!?! It drives me nuts.

I went off on a guy yesterday that was sitting at the fuel pump, not fueling, talking on his phone and dumping a bottle of piss out of his window. He told me to mind my own business. I almost lost it but it's not worth spending the night in jail for and losing my job.

We have to start policing ourselves when possible at these Walmarts before they all cut us off completely.

Good idea about the shopping carts. I always run mine back to the cart stall but I'll grab a few extras next time.

Yes, they are!

Yeah, I'm not sure how those people at these places put up with some of us. I would go insane at picking up some of the nasty #### around here. I hate smelling piss when I get out of my truck at some of these truckstops.

I would say that I see a lot of drivers acting civil but it's probably the same ones that do the same nasty stuff everywhere. I lose it when I go into a bathroom stall that has been all nastied up. Don't even get me started on that issue.