Chains and chain alternatives....

California is the WORST when it comes to putting on chains. You can easily see the ruts on the CONCRETE I-80 highway, due to putting out chain controls, the minute there is ANY snowfall.

Too often the snowfall ends quite early, and so the iron is doing nothing but chewing up the concrete.

BTW, it takes me well over an hour to put chains on a drive axle and two trailers, when its at
night, with a cold blowing wind and only my flashlight for illumination. 45 minutes is only done during daylight hours, before the wind factors chills you and your fingers to the bone real fast.

California really is full of fruits and nuts. Having rigs slow down to 20 MPH during a light snowfall would be much better, but this is Kookafornia we are speaking of, where libtards rule the state.

 

I'm taking a service failure before I take any steep western mountain passes during a blizzard, with chains. Not only isn't the load not worth my life, but even if I live through the crash, it's going to be a lot harder to explain a preventable accident to the guys at safety when I'm applying with a new company, than it will be a service failure for refusing to destroy myself or a truck in a blizzard. It's your life and your career. #### the dispatcher.

 

Yeah, if you dont believe that you can make it, shut that sombitch down. The life you save might be your own. Chains dont work all that well on Black Ice, either. Slowing down does save lives, period.

 

Negatory.
I'm sure both of you are familiar with the term "just in time delivery". Our hospitals do not have a week's worth of inventory on hand: they simply don't have the capacity for it. They would literally have to have a substantial sized warehouse onsite to accommodate the inventory. We are their warehouse. Hospitals are required by law to have three days worth of supplies on hand. You may not be aware that takes up substantial space already. Several of our larger hospitals are using up to twenty pallets worth of supplies literally every day, and we are replacing that stock literally every day.

As far as there being times we will not make the run: we will make the run. We haven't failed to make a run yet, and we have contingencies in place to make sure the run is made. What we do isn't optional, it is vital.

Here's an example. On the map, the blue line represents the normal route our drivers take, with the green "X" being their meeting point to swap trailers. If the pass should be closed more than a couple hours, then plan "B" kicks in. Our drivers will follow the red line, also meeting at the green "X" on the Oregon side. And this can be after the west side driver has been sitting on Snoqualmie for a while. He will turn around and head south to meet the east side driver.


As I and others have said, chaining to get over the passes here is simply a fact of life. If some don't want to do so, more power to them, but if you live here, and your job takes you over the pass, you just do it, or find another job.

 

And i assume you are getting compensated according to the urgency of your load. I make X CPM. I make exactly the same CPM whether I sit for bad weather or don't.

I don't LIKE to sit out for bad weather, but for instance, Ice storms, I WILL NOT drive through. If there's 1" of ice on the road, it's not safe for me or anyone else. And chains will make both minimal difference as to safety, and make my maximum speed 30 MPH. Doing 30 MPH for 5 hours after taking an hour + to chain up is very small gain when I could just wait for the weather to break, for VERY high-risk driving.

Made this call before driving through Chicago last winter and was glad I did it. NASTY Ice storm that lasted on the road, about 7 hours. I shut down in Indiana for a 10 and was GTG when I got up. Cost me about 4 hours, which, doing the math, would have got me about as far, for a LOT more work and risk.

 

Our company doesnt care! Expected to chain up on Snoqualmie Pass or Blewett Pass or Umatash Ridge.Gotta do it quick,so you"re not late!. No sniveling,no excuses,do it! They dont care about conditions.

 

Our company doesnt care that you can barely keep it on the road.Ive slid around going down Blewett Pass in Wenatchee Wa.Just git er done.

 

We're compensated hourly, and we work in shifts; we go out at night, and we're back in the morning, then we do it again that night. Our pay rate doesn't depend on conditions, it stays the same. And we are paid fairly well for what we do.

We will only adjust our plans if a particular highway is impassable, and for every run we do, we have backup plans (the map in my last post is the example for that run in particular. Every route we do has similar contingencies).

We have driven through heavy snow, ice, heavy fog, windstorms, dust storms, torrential downpours, and we do it all at night, to boot. A couple of my own examples, both heading to the same hospital, both last winter:
-Driving eastbound on I-84 in Oregon in subfreezing weather with approximately 1-2 inches of ice with a dusting of snow over the top. Normally the wind howls through there east to west. This is the one night where it decided to blow south to north, hitting me broadside with a respectable sustained wind, enough to push me sideways. I hunkered down at about 20 mph in a 55 zone, and pushed my way through until I crossed the open area I happened to be in, and was protected by hills. I was one of only a handful of trucks on that highway, the only other ones being the LTL carriers.
-Going to the same location, but this time I-84 was closed due to trees getting blown down onto the highway from heavy rains that saturated the ground, then high winds on top of it. Again, I was out there with the LTLs, rerouting onto highway 14 on the Washington side, driving down a two lane, serpentine highway with several tunnels with just enough clearance for trucks only if you went through straddling the center line, all the while having to watch for fallen trees and weave your way around them as well.

As I said, stopping is not an option for us.

 

I would quit that company instantly.

Unless they are paying you truly extravagant amounts of money, it cannot possibly be worth the risk. Both to your safety and to your CDL.

 

Our manager has told us time and again that he trusts our judgement , and he has our backs; if we tell him it can't be done, he accepts that as final word. To date, though, we have never failed on a single delivery, and we're approaching a million safe miles just for this year alone, with a total of 14 drivers.