So what happens if...

I am not trying to say that I should not have gotten the ticket for failure to maintain, I am saying the OOS ticket for the tire is at best a leap since I checked the truck about 4 hours prior and there was no damage. I also heard nothing while driving it, and when I stopped at a rest area to let the dog out I didn't notice anything on the tire. Granted I wasn't really looking at that moment the fact remains that with a rip that badly it is easily noticed and when I jumped out the truck to survey the results of my stupidity I noticed that tire rip immediatly.

I did not lose control of the truck and run off the road. I failed to make a proper swing out and ditched the trailer back tandems. The tractor never saw ditch. As Brickman said, it is not nessicarily an easy turn and just as I made the turn a car decided to ignore me and go straight through despite my having right of way. In hindsight I should have stopped and let the idiot thru not took the turn more shallow to avoid.

I do not fear big bad Werner coming and seeing the photos. I made no mistake of what happened when I contacted them about pulling me out of the ditch and fixing the tire long before Mrs. DOT showed up. I got hit with paying the tow fee over the next few months, that was the extent of my punishment. I never even got a Safety meeting or drug test. I should stress this is a 5 month old incident. And I am hardly the only one to ever ditch a trailer or truck. At no time was the truck going to be rolled over; I failed to swing out wide enough to account for the entire trailer, it would have taken me trying to turn like a car to roll in that ditch.

The friendly local cop told me I was the fifth truck that month to be ditched in that ditch. The tire got fixed within an hour or so of getting out of the ditch. Though it later caused us to get shutdown in a terminal due to the tire being a trailer tire that they replaced it with. Something about mismatched heights or something.

I did not NOTICE a street sign/marker that was runned over, though I suppose there could have been one. I did not however run over one on the left, as I never even made it far enough on the left side to get off the road, that was the issue in the first place. The car was between me and the tiny shoulder on the left to run off I'd had to hit the car first. And further on that point, I could post video that shows that the other side of the road is a very very steep ditch which would have easily rolled the truck over had I hit.

I got a ticket for Failure to Maintain Control, and a tire being ripped more then something something on the sidewall.

 

That is my question there in a nutshell. If I had ALREADY noted the damage, secured a tow, and repair for the issue BEFORE the DOT showed up then can I fight the ticket on the grounds that the truck was already technically considered OOS by I and the company?

I have already called and got told that they would happily supply the logs for the date/time in question showing such in court, I am just wondering if there is anything that would save me from the ticket of the OOS variety, the other one for failure to maintain control I am working to have reduced to a slighlty more expensive but non-logged fine.