CRETE - A Year in Review

2008​

WEEK NINE​

Monday February 25th through Sunday March 2nd ​

Well, it’s Monday again and time to get back to truck driving. I’ve sat at the Petro outside of Beaumont, TX and have had time to do a 34hr reset, although that was the last thing I needed at this point. But there was no freight in the area after my Saturday afternoon delivery and I had to wait until today to get loaded. I had an open PU time anytime after 8am and usually like to arrive at least one hour early but this shipper is just opening at 8am and if I show up too early I run the risk being turned away so I decided to arrive at 7:30am. I’m only 15 minutes away but run into heavy fogs almost as soon as I get started and a wrong turn finds me at the shipper at 8:15.

When I get there I find that there are two other drivers just coming out of the shipping office and am annoyed with myself for arriving too late. It turns out that there are only 2 loading docks and I will have to wait for an hour or so before I get my turn.

As things work out, I’m better off (for now) than the 7 other trucks that pull in behind me over the next 1/2hr.

Once the loading began I notice what was being put into the trucks at the dock and I was not at all please to see that not only was it a paper product (looked to be paper pulp in sheets), but it was being loaded on the floor of the trailer with NO pallets and even worse, NO slip sheets. Each bundle was simply wrapped with a heavy paper. This revelation sent shivers up my spin. Why, you may ask? I don’t know if you recall from last weeks recap but I had a very clear flashback relating to the somewhat formidable oil stain that I had discovered after delivering my load of insulation (that was a floor load and wrapped in plastic bundles) up in Montana.

This oil stain was of concern to me then, but there was nothing I could do at the time. My next load was bags of some kind of white powder (non toxic diatomaceous earth, or something along those lines) that was used to make plastic sheeting. When this was being unloaded the forklift operator had torn open one of the bags and a bit had spilled onto the floor. This worked out well at that moment because as I pushed it around with a broom it did what at the time seemed like a very good job of absorbing the oil on the floor of the trailer.

Now I get the feeling I’m about to pay for my lack of attention, or desire to deal with this problem effectively when I discovered it.

With this in mind I head back and open the door and jump up in the trailer to get a look at the problem area. Sure enough, the oil spot was still very obvious and right then and there I knew things were going to take a bad turn. I went into the warehouse and hunted down the supervisor to get my trailer inspected by him, there was no point in waiting another hour or so for the other trucks to get loaded only to back into my door and be refused then. The result was as expected and the trailer was rejected. Isn’t this great, sit all weekend and now here I sit with a trailer that can’t be loaded and a Monday morning dispatch that is probably being bombarded by a thousand unresolved weekend problems.

My messages to dispatch are answered with silence, just as I had expected. I don’t hold dispatch responsible; my daily hassles on the road can be a real pain in the back side. I can’t imagine what it would be like sitting in an office and trying to solve the problems of hundreds of drivers every day with Monday mornings throwing an entire weekend worth of problems in your lap all at once. With this in mind I do my best to remain patient (very trying) and after about an hour I start to get some correspondence. I basically told dispatch that the trailer can’t be floor loaded and a wash out wasn’t going to be effective on an oil saturated wood floor. I could PU a palleted load, but dispatch would not do that because the next driver would then be put in the same situation I was in. I suggested that I could take the trailer to the Wilmer, TX (300+mi) yard outside of Dallas but dispatch couldn’t approve that and they told me to contact Breakdown.

A message off to dispatch was meet with the same speedy response and after all the info was repeated I was giving clearance to pull the empty trailer to Wilmer. I headed that way and arrived in the yard at 4pm and was informed shortly thereafter that no loads were available and to check back after 9am in the morning. The worst thing about the whole ordeal is that if I would have addressed it after unloading in Houston on Saturday it wouldn’t be a problem today. There is no one to blame but myself (and the driver who dropped this trailer before I came across it).

Tuesday started with the hope of better things to come and I sent a message off to dispatch at 5am. This was earlier than dispatch had told me, but I wanted to get a head start on the other drivers if possible. I also let them know that I had been empty since Saturday and my trailer had been refused at the shipper and I was sitting here without a load, boo hoo, feel sorry for me kind of message and topped it off with a “I’m trying to get to Phoenix for hometime if you have anything going in that direction.”

I was surprised to get a response, “No freight going to Phoenix, but here is a load to Salt Lake City (1414mi), you can take this load and try getting a load to Phoenix form there.” Well, I couldn’t ask for much more than that in this freight climate, so I thanked them and accepted the load. The one big problem with this load is that it was an appointment delivery Friday morning and I had to be in Phoenix by Saturday for my Grandmothers 90th B-Day celebration.

This load was a drop/hook PU scheduled for anytime after 3pm in Paris, TX. I knew from previous loads at this shipper that the trailer was in all likelihood ready to go. With this in mind I headed out and made it there by 10am and sure enough it was ready.

The rest of Tuesday and Wednesday was spent driving with the intent of getting to SLC ASAP so that I could talk dispatch into Tcalling this load in our yard. I was also able to shave off about 100mi by taking two lane roads through the interior of New Mexico, Colorado and Utah instead of the interstate routing that the company had suggested. This saved me a good amount of time (not to mention completely avoiding a wind swept I-80 across Wyoming in the process) and made for some great scenery along the way.

;

Travel went well and I found myself in SLC by 8am Thursday morning. I sent a message off to dispatch and was allowed to Tcall my load in the yard but was also informed that there was no freight available to get me to Phoenix (they might be able to get me something going that way Friday morning). I was disappointed by this but not surprised. I had somewhat assumed this would be the case. I told dispatch I would find a way home on my own and set my return PTA for the following Tuesday.

I was initially going to rent a car and drive down to Phoenix (I found a compact for $20 day). It was a 650 mile trip and figured it wouldn’t be all that bad of a trip. At least I knew it would be much faster in a car that the truck. Just for kicks I was checking out airline tickets, but with no notice flights were running around $400. As an after thought I checked out hotwire for flights one last time and was delighted to come across a supper saver fair that wasn’t there an hour ago of only $205, including all taxes. WOW, what a deal for a last minute booking. The big concern here was that I could only pick the departure and arrival dates, not the times. But for that price I wasn’t going to fret over it. I put in my info and bought the flight. The flight times turn out to be very agreeable and I was set for some time off.

I found myself with nothing to do for the rest of Thursday (my flight didn’t leave until late) and had already put my truck in the shop for a B service. The shop found all kinds of things that needed to be replaced on my 600,000 mile truck and said it would have to be in the shop for a couple of days. Perfect timing on that one, I just told them I’d pick up the keys next week.

Once I got things settled with the shop I called dispatch and let them know I had access to a yard truck if they had any shag loads that needed to be done. They had a load that needed to be delivered and I shuttled a couple of empty trailers around town to occupy the rest of my day.

As evening rolled around I called a cab and headed over to the airport.

I would have rather pulled a load down to Phoenix, but things don’t always work out perfectly. I was just thrilled to be able to pickup my wife at the airport the next day and spend some very pleasant time with our families. The 80° days were nice too.



WEEK NINE RESULTS
Monday, February 25th through Sunday, March 2nd
Miles include deadhead

Beaumont, TX to Salt Lake City, UT…………………..1849


Total Paid Miles………………………………..……….1949 miles(Monday through Thursday)
Home time Friday through Monday
Actual Miles………………………1849 (took two lane roads to cut miles)

1949mi x .42 = $818.58 (plus shag pay $35)