Got to put a gladhand seal on it.

I have seen spare tires taken from underside racks, and tandems sitting on the ground after having the wheels and tires stolen. RIGHT IN TRUCK STOPS. I have had fuel stolen right out of my tanks as I slept over night. I am not trying to be combative here. Just trying to make it clear that your truck, trailer and load is not safe just because you are in the nations heartland and not the border. In fact I have seen MORE theft and wanton destruction 10 to 1 in the heartland over the borders over my trucking career. My comment might seem elementary to you old hands. However I am speaking more to the new guys here.

 

If I were going to steal your tires, I'd have taken those shiny new wheels also.

 

Need an air gun for that. Well, or very long wrench. To steal the tires just gotta deflate the tires, and take a bar and pop them off the rim.

 

Those rubber seals are often missing on my company trailers in Laredo too. Mexicans are taking them off. Period.

Something needs to be done. I’m calling Fox News.

 

Oh heck, since everyone else is telling their "what they heard story", I'll throw mine into the mix.

While working for a mega I would watch the Mexican shuttle drivers (back and forth across the border) drop a trailer in the yard (Laredo), and yes take out the seals every time. These guys were apparently contracted by my mega to do the shuttle thing, and they would pull out the seals and stuff them in their pocket in broad daylight for all to see each time they brought a trailer back across from Mexico.

My curiosity peaked so I asked the terminal manager what was the deal? He said that these shuttle drivers would pick up dropped trailers in Mexico that had been unloaded and that the seals were always missing. They would then have to put in their own seals in order to bring it across the border. Then when they would drop on our yard, they would just be retrieving their own seals back to use on their next load.

So there! My crap story is as good as ya'lls!

 

So they’re down there in Mexico complaining about how we steal ####?

 

I will admit he was legit, but I saw a man pull up in a work truck pop on his air pump put a jack under a tandem yank 2 wheels off and replace them with 2 news ones air drive the nuts snug then torque them with a 4 way in just about 10 minutes.Most of the time trailers don't have the expensive wheels just the tractors. It is like copper wire. The money you can get from reselling them makes these things very tempting to steal.

 

There was a place in Otay Mesa CA where before we'd drop the trailer at the swap yard, we had to pop out all the lights and glad hand seals, and lay them down on a tarp outside the shipper office. The Mexican drivers had to provide their own lights and seals to get it over to Mexico.