FCC--Fremont Contract Carriers

When I was in there last week there were only two, now there’s three? That sucks! The first two thankfully died at home instead out on the road in the truck.

 

Well I’ve always tried to be open and honest with posts since starting this thread, so today I must regretfully post something I hoped I would never have to discuss on here.

The blizzard rolled through Nebraska last Friday, I made it to Fremont safely Friday, got my truck serviced and took my 10 hour break. When I went to bed the wind was still whipping pretty good, I figured I would get up about 0230 and check the wind. I woke up and the wind had died down considerably, so I rolled down to Lincoln to pick up my preloaded trailer. The roads from Fremont to Lincoln were in pretty good shape. I made it to Lincoln, grabbed my loaded trailer and headed towards Georgia. Coming through Lincoln on Hwy 2 the roads were in good shape, I got through the final light on the East side of Lincoln and started towards Iowa. About 2 miles later I could see a flashing lights ahead, as I got closer I saw a jackknifed semi partially in the median, with his trailer out into the hammer lane, I slowed down, and moved over to the right lane. At this point I noticed two other big trucks ahead in the ditch on either side, and two four wheelers spun out as well, I thought “okay this is a sheet of ice, don’t touch the brake or accelerator just roll through and take it easy.” No sooner as I passed the first jackknifed semi and sheriffs cruiser my drives broke loose, I made an attempt to counter steer, but I was jackknifing beyond the point of saving it. At this point I was along for the ride, I just hoped I didn’t hit anyone else or cross into oncoming lanes of traffic. The trailer momentarily came all the way around, the tractor hit the median, and then the trailer swung back around hard.

When it was all said and done I was facing back West in the median. I was stunned, it happened in an instant. 25 years of a perfect safety record, gone in a blink of an eye.

I made the appropriate phone calls to the safety department and police. Like always FCC was amazing, the had a tow truck out there within a couple hours, they repaired my sheered off airlines, pulled my out of the median, and after we looked over the truck and trailer it was determined I could drive it back to the customer to get the freight put on another trailer. Luckily know one else was in involved, the only injury’s I suffered was a damaged ego and tarnished pride. The freight was undamaged, my truck sustained over $21K in damage, and the trailer sustained some damage.

FCC put me in a loaner until my truck is repaired. Today I met with the safety department, we watched the onboard camera video, I must do some remedial on line training, but I thankfully still have my job. If I could go back and change anything that morning, maybe I would have waited until the sun came up, hindsight is 20/20. All I can do is learn from this, and try and build up my safety record one mile, one day, and one week at a time.

 

On a more positive note, I delivered the Georgia load in Ellabell, reloaded in Ringgold going to Valley, Nebraska. Dropped that this morning, deadheaded over to Aurora, and picked up a preloaded trailer going out to Wally World in Utah for a live unload Saturday morning. I will then bounce back to Ogden and pick up a preloaded trailer going to Minnesota for Monday at noon.