Thank you all!!!
7500 dispatched miles is the official training period, it usually takes about 3 weeks.
NOW FOR THE UPDATE!!
Well my first few days are in the books (so to speak)! Here is what has happened so far:
We called in to our fleet manager on thursday to see if we could get a pre-plan for friday (which is when we were scheduled to board). The planners gave us a load that was scheduled to pick up Friday at 1PM in Knoxville, TN (which is just over 100 miles from where we live). It was scheduled to deliver the same day at 10 PM just under 500 miles away in Greencastle, PA.
Since it would have been tight (if not impossible) to do all in 1 day we decided to drive down to Knoxville thursday night and stage at the customer. It turns out this was a very good idea because my first day was a little stressful on both of us. My shifting in this new truck was rough at first and I was nervous from not having driven in a while. This truck also turns a lot different from the school trucks so my first back was horrible (I couldn't even straight back for crap).
After we got to the customer and dropped our trailer we bobtailed to a truck stop and parked for the night, ate dinner, and got some rest.
We woke up friday to a message on our qualcomm saying that our destination had been changed to Monticello, Fl instead. We drove back over to the customer and checked in again only to find out that our load would not only not be ready early but it might not even be ready on time. We ended up not getting out of there til about 30 minutes late. This put us running late already because of how tight the ETA was.
We took I75 south and everything was going smooth until we got near Atlanta. Then we ran into multiple delays including some high winds and heavy rain, a back up due to people looking at an accident on the northbound side, and then hitting Atlanta at 5 PM on a Friday and getting caught in it's horrible rush hour traffic.
After we made it through Atlanta things went pretty smooth. Chris ended up taking over not to far south of there because the last part of the trip was on back roads and we were already behind because of the late loading at the shipper and then the delays in transit. It was probably for the better anyway because 300 miles including lots and lots of firsts for me was enough for my second day.
Chris drove us the last 200 or so miles to the customer (although we were still 26 minutes late, no thanks to the shipper loading us late). Once we got there the customer said they weren't in a rush to unload it so Chris let me dock the trailer (with him ground guiding of course) and that back went a whole lot better than the first days did). Once we dropped our trailer we bobtailed to get some food and then came back and hooked to our empty. Before we had even finished getting hooked up and everything we got sent over our next load.
Our current load was a relay picking up in Pensacola, FL today from another driver who was going on home time. It is scheduled to deliver Tuesday night in Nogales, AZ (but is drop and hook so we can deliver it as soon as we get there).
Today was a pretty good day for my third day of training. I did even better with my shifting and didn't have any problems come up. We even went over some of the reading material we have to cover during training. Here's how my day went:
We got up about 7:30 and got some breakfast and then hit the road. I drove to the relay point which was a tiny hole in the wall truck stop where he had to back us into the spot but I did the rest (dropped our empty, hooked to the load, sent over the proper msg's, etc), then I drove from Pensacola, FL to Hammond, LA and parked at the Petro (where my back wasn't to bad and was my first truck stop back) where we are now parked for our break. I ended up driving a total of about 430 miles.
Tomorrow I plan to drive my first full shift if at all possible and will update tomorrow if I have time (and energy).
I hope you all are doing well!
Stay safe out there drivers!
Katey
From idea to actuality!
Discussion in 'Questions From New Drivers' started by Katey, Nov 27, 2010.
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Sorry my updates are few and far between, we have been busy busy
I don't have time for as detailed an update as the last one but here's a quick run down:
We delivered the Pensacola, FL to Nogales, AZ load tuesday afternoon and got assigned a new load picking up in Nogales going to San Diego, CA.
When we got assigned this load we were VERY excited even though it was only a 473 miles run. The reason we were so excited was because we have some good friends that live in San Diego who we had been hoping to meet up with for a very long time.
Once we arrived in San Diego we delivered the load then parked for the night. We met up with our friends and, although we ended up getting our sleep schedule a bit turned upside down to do it, it was totally worth it.
Our next load picked up 122 miles away in Calexico, CA and that is the load we are currently on now. It delivers tomorrow at 11 AM PDT in East Wenatchee, WA. It has been an interesting load as the whole route was mostly back roads. I got to do my first serious mountain pass today, "Cabbage" in Oregon on I-84. Chris said I did well, I went really slow but it was nice because I was in just the right gear that my jake brake could hold me at a steady speed and I didn't have to use my foot brake at all. Not gonna burn em up that way
We are still a little ways away so we are gonna leave out early in the morning. We dont have much in the way of hours but will be getting ok numbers back the next few days so hopefully we will get a decent run tomorrow. I will let you all know
Well time for dinner, a movie, and bed I think.
Stay safe out there drivers!
KateyWedge Thanks this. -
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Way to go, Katey! I still haven't successfully managed a live back (those suckers scare me to death when there are things to hit), but Joe tells me flatbeds turn a LOT differently, especially with a spread axel. Sounds like you're doing great for three days out and staying plenty busy.
Keep up the good work, keep us updated, and maybe we'll catch each other on the road someday.
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