Ask a Yard Dog

In my experience, you just get an ### chewing from your boss. I broke a door off the trailer when I first started. It was tied open when I pulled the trailer out, but by time I had set up to dock it in the hole, the door had come 'untied' and was just dangling there swinging open. I backed into the dock and the thing just broke off the hinges. I put that door into the empty trailer and rushed it over to our yard, filled out a report, and come monday morning , was met with a slightly-annoyed terminal manager asking 'what happened to that door??'

Now dropping a trailer is a little different, I've heard horror stories of guys raising the loaded trailer 5th wheel all the way, and driving away--those guys who forgot to do a tug test and dropped a RAISED 55k pound trailer to the ground. I'm sure you get drug tested ASAP if you do that , in addition to getting whatever safety bonus taken away.

 

As a Yard Dog driver, I really don't pay much attention to what the "Road Drivers" are doing when they come on the yard. I am usually running around looking for a certain trailer and don't really know what they are supposed to be doing anyway. If any flag me down I am always glad to help them anyway I can because I know they are away from home and just want to get unloaded and out of here, but they have to flag me down, otherwise I am not too concerned about what they are doing. It's funny, many act like we are the yard police but we are just working same as you. It's not my place to be a yard policeman so unless they need help with something I wave as I go by but I leave them alone. As far as the money I will over $50k this year working a 5 day 60 hour week. That's better than I made as an OTR Solo Driver. I work for USXpress running a yard dog at one of our customers yards.

 

I sometimes drive a yard dog on my overtime days. At my employer you have to familiarize yourself with various trucks ranging from tandem axle freightshakers to single axle Mack's as they love jumpseating you.

When you're at a DC, there's a few things you need to remember.

1) Pay attention and follow instructions.

As as a yard dog, I won't give you 'orders' parse, but I will give you advice on where you need to be. Also most of us have a direct CB link to the dispatcher.

2) you aren't the only driver here with freight. Without getting too much into boring details, freight needs to be continuously shuffled around. Most drivers are clueless about what happens to their freight when it's not in their trailer, and it really shows when a driver starts complaining.

3) treat people how you want to be treated. It's the golden rule you learned in school. If you give people an attitude, the favor will be returned.

4) Work safely, but also fast. Don't hold up the yard dogs, line drivers and city drivers by taking all day to back into a bay. We understand that everyone needs to learn how to back, but a DC isn't a good place to learn. If you're having problems backing or hooking to trailers, ask one of us yard dogs to do it for you. That's what were here for.

 

And yes, I agree with the earlier statement about dropping trailers too low. Sometimes drivers drop their trailers so low that the only way I can get under it is to build up some speed.