Runaway ramps

not at all.

 

either way your getting ######

 

Escape ramps are a absolute last resort.

Take the recent Cuban who bypassed MILES of qualified ramps able to stop his rig and killed a hurt a number of people. He's awaiting trial.

If you ever have to use them take them dead center with both feet braced hard flat on the cab floor, seat locked and your head and spine back into it. Instead of trying to remember too many things whil the world comes apart around you. Your goal is to get stopped. I don't care how you do it get it stopped.
Some ramps will hang your tractor over the abyss if your 5th wheel is of good quality.

You will find in my recent previous AM's formal forum Survey of the Luke Maryland Hill by myself on State Route 135, you will see such a ramp. Its about a mile downgrade. You may fall off the mountain if you make a hash of that entry. That's ok, there is room for another.

As far as the immediate shower, it's nice but take proper precautions. In a forest situation you can still get Typhus and a number of other infectious pathways. My last one in the ohio rest area involved a blood borne pathological threat from a drug addict shooting up in the nice peaceful quiet stall. Whose has the balls big enough to bathe HIM takin a hit.

I have learned since to reduce the hygiene needs to strictly a pot of water, a towel and two liquid squirt medical cleaning supplies. You can be just as clean if not cleaner without the additional complications of going too long in between in times of water conservation.

 

i think that many CDL schools and the driver training manuals put the fear into you about what truck runaway ramps are there for.

proper teaching, PROPER learning, proper techniques, proper speed control, braking control, your first "few times" down some of America's mountains will be a scary experience.

my first time (you never forget your first time in ANY THING that you do in life), it was a cold spring day. i had to go thru Colorado. I could not take the Eisenhower tunnel, due to (i really remember this), a dumb JB Hunt driver...BACKING OUT of the tunnel....!!!! (this was going west bound...

so i had to take the Rte 6 by-pass thru Vail, CO..

switch back curves, downgrades, narrow 2 lanes all down hill..

i had the windows open, the a/c on (again COLD early spring), and i was sweating like a pig going to the slaughterhouse..

but i made it...yeah, i smoked my brakes a time or two, pulled over, let them cool and went on..

after THAT heart-pounding trip......every other mountain was (to me) an ant hill, that I STILL RESPECTED for what it was, and what it CAN DO to me....

 

oh yeah, NO working jake brake, COE international, and a student co-driver as well with me...oy vey.....

 

yea but cell mates do have loyalty. if you need to take a do. all you got to do is ask. they will walk out of the room.

 

The newer style runaway ramps have lots of loose gravel to stop the truck. They do minimal damage, one guy only had the front license plate ripped off. Plus the tow truck to get out.

 

I don't think he knows enough or is trained at all. I got a glimpse of him via reedit that I visit a time or two to access or update news events that no one else in media covers today. And what I saw is essentially a young person, not quite full grown who did not recieve what was needed to be taught him properly by the trucking industry. Lack of training is not a defense to the killing. But it certainly stacks the body count when companies do not care to spend time training new drivers properly.

God only knows I was trained to the Nth degree. But that was two generations ago. Today no one trains anyone it seems. Here have keys, get this load, get going yer late. Especially from the fly by night shady companies who interest in raking in possibly illegal gains. And training for them just gets in the way.

It is my prayer and positive hope that this particular Court and Decisions are made and rendered to where it will be case law and make it possible so that the Industry will wake up and say Gee we need to train these youngsters. Or I will be put out of business and into prison when my new hire kills a bunch of people tomorrow in Colorado.

One last thought.

No one in my time got sent to Colorado mountains or Donner etc until or unless 1-They grew up in the area, 2- they have previously run loads through those territories without accidents or incidents 3- they have been paired with a trainer long enough in those areas so the company can feel that they are sufficiently ready to make their own decisions on those mountain runs.

I understand some of those passes are closed all winter. Maybe we should close all of them For public safety. If people wanna go to Vail, they can fly in easily enough.

 

the "few" thousands of dollars in a ramp clean up, will always be the best money spent, over the MILLIONS of dollars in lawsuits.