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Thanks Mrs. T, I recieved a message from Gears explaining things. Mucho thanks again! Levi39

 

This happened one night when I was trying to get home for Christmas. I was living in Pittsburgh PA. and during the week I would go down to Charleston WV. and work out of that terminal, as I liked the area and the folks in that area. Being a "country boy" I just fit in there better than I did in Pittsburgh. I worked the day before xmas delivering local freight in the area. That afternoon came a winter storm that covered most of WV. and north into Pensylvania and Ohio with a lot of snow. That evening I talked the company into letting me go home. I had listened to weather reports and found out that my usual rt. home I-79 was closed to all traffic due to the heavy snow from Clarksburg WV. north to the state line. I-77 my alternate rt. home was open but snowpacked and passable. Being the night before xmas there was no freight so I had to pull an empty trailer. I decided to give it a go. about 8pm I pulled out, it was black dark and snow was still coming down and blowing everywhich way. There was very little traffic and I pretty much had the road to myself. I made it to Marrietta at the Ohio line, stopped and got a coffee to go and went back to truckin. Just north of the Ohio line was a state scale that they were making over into a rest area and it was under construction. about the time I was Passing it I heard this huge crashing noise and felt my truck cab jolt and reviberate. I looked behind me as I thought someone had run into my trailer but could not see anything because of the heavy snow and pitch black night. About this time I glanced out my right door window to see if I could see anything and low and behold --- I see this trailer passing me! no tractor, just the trailer! my thoughts Holy S--t!! a split second later I realized it was MY TRAILER!!! It had come off the 5th wheel and was sliding past me on the dolly legs. The noise I had heard was the air lines coming off and slapping the back of the cab. the trailer veered off the road up an incline and came to rest against the guard rail on the rest area exit ramp. I backed my tractor up the ramp and checked everything out, ammazed that there was no apparent dammage except two small dents in the back of my cab where the glad hands had smacked it. I dollyed up the trailer and hooked back up. I could not see any thing wrong with the 5th wheel. the jaws looked fine and all the lines hooked up, so I gave it a couple of good tugs and having satisfied myself that all was well and safe, I went on to the house. After thinking about it I figured it must not have been hooked right from the git go, but that really did not make any sense as I had already pulled the trailer about a hundred miles. After the holliday I reported the happening to the co. and the mechanics at the shop, I don't think they believed me until about a week later another trailer came loose on another driver. They found faulty 5th wheels on several of the trucks that had that series of 5th wheels installed on them. It didn't take them long to replace all of them. The other driver involved was not so lucky as me, his trailer was loaded and wrecked!! luckly no one was injured. Levi39

 

Hi darren, and welcome! Interesting to me that your a car hauler. As a youngster I worked for a co. that hauld cars [ not as a driver ] but I did learn quite a bit about the business. Of course this was many years ago as I am now a retired freight hauler [ LTL ]. any way Welcome and happy trails!! Levi39