Knight Transportation

Well you could apply that theory to just about any time you drive. are you gonna wait till it stops raining or being foggy because someone may hydroplane or not see you and run into you. How about no driving after 5 because drunks may be leaving a bar and run into you? Maybe wait for 3 hours before going through any city during the commute because people are in a hurry to get home.

Of coarse you don't want to drive in a blizzard or on sheets of ice, but if you get 2 feet of snow in a place like Seattle or Portland and it is on the roads for weeks at a time because they don't want to upset the PH balance for Salmon by using salt you will be sitting a long time if you don't think it is safe to drive with chains on.

That's fine, but why would someone pick a career such as driving if they where not comfortable in winter driving conditions? That's like having a fear of flying yet becoming a Pilot. Doesn't make sense to me that someone would pick a occupation that with such fear. It's not fun to drive in the winter but you just slow down and take more breaks and you will be fine.

 

I guarantee a student going to truck driving school and going through orientation with a company has never thought about what its like driving a truck and trailer in winter conditions. Just ask those who live in the southern states who may have never seen more than one inch of snow. I live in Portland and when I decided to drive truck snow never entered my mind, nor did I even think about how heavy them #### chains are. As far as you mentioning Seattle and Portland having snow for a week, this is the most we have had in my 41 years living here. I couldnt imagine every trucker chaining up everytime the law go's up, the half that choose to wait a day or 10 hours is actualy a benefit to those of us who do chain. Half the drivers out here are young and/or inexperienced, so I would never force them to chain or intimidate them, its an accident waiting to happen. Just my .02 . Drive Safe

 

Personal Attacks will not be tolerated

 

Personal attacks aside, if you work as a OTR truck driver you work for free. To say I had or have any culpability in this is ridiculuos at best. I did not start driving till after the deregulation of the industry.

Now a prison ##### would be someone who was to timid to ask the carrier if they compensated the drivers extra for chaining, and then complained about it later.

You see chaining your truck as extra work you should be compensated for and I see it as a necessary evil to get you from point A to point B. I also pay attention when I go to orientation at a trucking company and all the ones I have been to said in the job description that driving in adverse weather conditions was part of the job.

I also ask about what I will be compensated for before I seat a truck, not complain about it afterwards if it was not agreed to before I started. Did your company say they would pay you to chain and are now saying no? Well there you have it.

Your kidding right? How could anyone go through a legit driving school and orientation not to mention taking the tests at the DMV and be totally oblivious to the fact that they would on occasion be required to drive in less then ideal conditions?

Now I would buy that you may not of considered it before starting your training and may of hidden in your bedroom all winter in Portland to avoid see CM Vs driving around, but being totally oblivious after getting out of orientation and being with a trainer? Don't think so.

I have trained drivers from the southeast and none of them where oblivious to the dangers posed when driving in the winter. In fact they where more surprised with the affects of wind on a CMV then that.

I don't think that one should do what they are not comfortable doing when they are new or inexperienced or tired. But just how much experience do you get chaining or driving on chains if you never do it?

By the way I get payed by the hour now about 80% of the time. So I doubt I am doing much for free and ruining it for the OTR driver.

 

Sorry, but I have to disagree with you here. First off, I don't think where you live really matters. If you are going to be driving OTR you need to realize that you WILL be doing some winter driving. I can't believe that anyone is so "protected" that they don't see news reports of what road conditions are like all across the country.
As to forcing an inexperienced driver to chain up and learn to drive on ice and snow, how else are they going to learn? As a general rule, I always figured it was better to wait for a couple of hours, if that would do the trick.
But there are times that it doesn't. AND, if that driver ever has to chain up to get out of a problem, wouldn't it be better if he actually knew how to do it, and had done it?

 

Now I know why you chain, you have no choice. Probably LTL and must meet another driver at the other end, but OTR have a choice and I do chain but as mentioned before I was defending the otherside. I'm not sure why your discussing this subject in the Knight section but it looks like we all got pulled into it and carried it way off course.

 

Good point Big Don, but we could also argue if its ok to drive on the shoulder up a hill at 25 mph letting others pass by. But both sides of our arguments could go on forever. Drive Safe and Happy New Year

 

I think it started back when someone said Knight Trans was forcing drivers to chain. Which I doubt unless it was a condition set forth before the load was pu. Knight is not a force DP company from what I hear.

No I don't have to chain but I have a 4x4 and had to chain that just to get to my house. The roads where crap for almost 2 weeks up here and in the Portland area.

My friend that works for Knight said that one of their Canada drivers went up to Hope B.C. and Jacknifed the truck and the driver and Knight have to pay a big fine for blocking the road due to not chaining I guess they have a law like Colorado about blocking roadways.

 

As a Knight Refrigerated driver drive I can say that they DO NOT force you to do a thing. Now having said that I have seen way to many people coming into trucking not knowing they would have to drive in the rain/snow/ice/dark ect...ect...

To many people see trucking movies and think that is how it is. They never research and find out that this IS a job and that frieght HAS to move. If you can't drive when the weather is bad then you need to go fine a nice office job. If you can't put on a set of chains then you need to learn how or get out of the truck.

 

There Canada Fleet is forced DP, but that is considered a dedicated fleet. They Only run BC WA and OR.