Have to start somewhere

Hey man, don't sweat it. We've all been there. I tore up alot of equipement when I first started and I never thought I'd make it as long as I have. If you really enjoy doing what your doing you will find a way to keep doing it. Good luck.

 

Poop happens Daytona, I'd bet they need you more than you need them... don't sweat it quite yet.

When I first started driving, on my very first trip solo, I blew out a couple tires on a trailer by having to pull it through a ditch to turn around on a very skinny road I shouldn't have been on in the first place.

I was ready for them to fire me when I got to Atlanta... but they said NOTHING about it.


Then there was the time at Morton Salt in Detroit (driving for a different company)... I proceeded to back into the dock with a roll-up door trailer. Those of you who pull roll-ups may already know what happened next...

It wasn't until I went inside to roll up the door, and saw the guy on the dock shaking his head, that I realized this door was gonna roll no more--the automatic dock plate came up and smashed the door in as I backed in. Oops!

The hell of it is, three of our drivers had done the same thing in the previous week and dispatch didn't even so much as say, "Don't forget to roll the door up before you back in."

And then...

There was the time I went mud-bogging with my brand new truck in Orville, OH. I missed the turn at Smuckers and turned around in another company's gravel lot. Rain had been coming down for quite some time I suspect because the truck sunk about two feet into the fresh gravel and clay. Their lot was completely destroyed after I spent a few hours going back and forth and back and forth to get out. This was at night... nobody there... so in my youthful mind, the best option was to get the hell outta Dodge and pretend it never happened.

I'll bet to this day, there are still chunks of mud stuck in the frame of that truck... some 15 years later.

 

smuckers is easy to miss.... (I turned around in the same gravel lot a few times I bet...)

 

Oh Gosh, I'm starting to have nightmares of the #### I did way back when,lol!

 

I'm driving a concrete truck right now, have been for the last 4 years. I'm going to school in Feb to get my class A. When I started driving I had my share of incidents, and when I start otr I'm sure I'll have my share. Nobodys perfect.

 

See, look at my spelling! (nobodys) LOL

 

Wow, what to say! It might not be the end of your time at that company!
I took out an entire row of mailboxes, got the truck stuck on top of them, had an entire highway blocked for hours and hours until another truck could come pull me out in my green years........like others said, I never heard a thing about it. Took out the oil pan in a - forgettable stint when I first started pulling belly dumps, the only person to say ANYTHING was the MECHANIC!! "Hey, man, YOU are responsible for this equipment - yada yada yada" Well dude, at least I didn't burn up the engine!!

Tore out part of the FRAME on a 53 foot van going over some railroad tracks while going over them at completely the wrong angle (totally my fault, the sound was that of a bomb going off); Tore out all kinds of tires in my first years doing - things I would rather not remember; dragged a trailer with blown air line ten miles down the road before looking into the rear view mirror and seeing - NOTHING, there was so much smoke coming from the brakes there was a HUGE cloud that blocked out the view of anything behind me!!

And, I was driving over "back roads" if you can call them that attempting to get around scales in Texas on icy roads - the ice was 3 inches thick - sorta slid into "something" - didn't lose my job there, either. Trees, curbs, signs, mailboxes, on and on and on, and in all of those instances, I was apologizing profusely, yet the companies didn't say anything more than "gee, ben, HOW did you do THAT to the frame on that trailer?"

Don't give up hope, really, I don't believe it's the end of your career, unless you want it to be!!!

Hey, it's 2008, which marks the "year of new beginings", I bid you well, good luck and a prosperous New Year and Career!
bb

 

Wow Daytona... sorry for the delay! That sucks but I agree with the others... #### happens and that was a minor incident compared to others. One of my classmates has already rolled his truck when he ran off the raod trying to pick something up off the floor and the load shifted when he tried to jerk it back onto the road to avoid a pole and while he is on probation and had to do a week safety/driving class he still has his job. From what I understand, in Dec our comapny had 9 major accidents with one being a fatality. Hang in there.... you'll be fine!

On a brighter note.... HAPPY NEW YEARS EVERYONE!

 

A habit I've gotten into over the years is to do a walkaround after anytime I've stopped the truck and gotten out. Even if it was 2 minutes, I'll walk clean around the truck checking everything to ensure that something isn't afoul.

I don't care if it's a pain in the arse, it's worth the trouble as I have "found" things on occasions that if I had moved the truck, there would have been trouble with a capital T. I think many trucking companies are "requiring" drivers to get out before backing. Yeah, I know, it's another pain, but sometimes, that pain keeps you from doing something you definitely wouldn't have wanted to do, including putting people in serious harm's way.

Really, though, what I wanted to add was to "keep your chin up", KEEP your confidence high - it's hell to drive after you've gotten into an accident, it can play serious games with your head and can mess with your driving - put this incident behind you as fast as possible - but remembering whatever "lessons" that were learned from it - and keep it rolling. If they haven't canned you already, they undoubtedly AREN'T GOING TO!!
bb