Any bored trucker want to answer a few questions?

I did, thank you. I have been driving since last summer.

I'm sorry for your loss. My guess is that the wreck was caused by the reckless driving of a nearby car. That is one of the things that has surprised me the most as a trucker. Those in cars around me aren't just oblivious - they are reckless and unbelievably stupid. Every trucker should have a dashcam, and mirror cameras too, if possible. Everyone thinks the trucker is always to blame, but I suspect that's rarely the case.

 

qstaffenthree made a small but rather important observation. About once or twice in your time on the young trucker's path in life, there will be someone old enough to be what I call a trucker daddy. That person will pass along to you some important things about trucking only as that person can do to you. You will know it when you meet one. If you do in employment, then you probably will find no better place to work as you grow over the years.

Not everyone is going to get through the trucking in good shape to retire etc. That's not going to happen. What you can do is make ready any way you can for trouble with trauma, end of life, medical directives (Aka living wills etc) and other considerations so that if that big bad trailer starts wagging you off Cabbage and you get killed, a phone call takes care of all the arrangments preset by you. So your Kin wont have to deal with it anymore than they will have to.

Now Im probably going to catch a few darts and some teasing for such gloom and doom, but we ourselves have saved lives including our own many times more than we ought to have gotten away with. A small slip of any of the tires or a bad shift or failure in the rig anywhere in a few precious seconds would have been death to at least one person. That is why I am what I am.

 

Not always.

We are not ... whistle clean either. There are some bad ones. I used to be. Go back to around 1994 or 5 and hand me a 93 COE unlimited everything. I'll blaze by you at 130 loaded. The blast alone from the winds around the rig would be a danger to cars if they did not have anything on the wheel. I have had people spin because I caused them to.

That does not make it any better or any less wrong. Fast forward to my last years on the road, Ive gone the other way to where it's nothing at all to work around a idiot trucker or 4 wheeler to avoid a wreck where possible. Some of it believe it or not is a intentional set up by the car packed with half breeds stopping dead in front of your 18 wheeler. So you hit them, lose everything and then they get a multimillion pay out. Kaching.

That is where Bendix and ABS Gods kick in provided there is enough pavement to work around them. Fortunately they are so stupid as to literally broadcast their intention eyeballing you hard as they come up on your left slowly.

 

There are trucking co's. that give free training, so long as you agree to work for them for a specified time, usually a year.

Millis Transfer, Schneider, and others. I think Millis charges $500 just to make sure you're serious, check to verify.

 

Hi I wanted to get into trucking but don’t have my cdl so I wanted to find a trucking job non cdl driving to pick up and drop off loads. Do you know any good companies that are hiring?