NEWBIES......Driving Fatigued!!!!

Amen brother.

I am a team driving with my wife I drive nights- I see this all the time. I routinely pull over. Usually hits me about 0500 to 0600. Soon as it gets that purple/ blue out. Thats when it gets tough. Even though I might have only 3 hours left I still take a quickie nap. After a night of headlight, and those bedamned light up billboards it gets to you. I stop, let the sun come up, (about and hour) then I'm good until 1000. We stop again, 2 hours sleep with the truck still and she takes over at noon.

Anyone who says they have never fallen asleep at the wheel is lying to you. Maybe not fully asleep, but all of us have had those days. You see mile marker 72, then what seems like 5 seconds later mile marker 145.... even though your eyes were open, anything could have happened and you'd have been unaware. Then you sit up, look around check the mirrors, and thank whatever power that be nothing did happen... you were asleep my friend. We've all done it... time to pull that bad boy over and take a brake.

Just like hurricane, or floods, you'll hear people say no possesions are worth dying for, its just a house... it's just a load, no worth dying over, nor killing. Even worse than somehting happening to you how would you feel if you killed some innocent people.

 

I can tell you i've never fallen asleep at the wheel. Then again, i've only been driving for 8 months. Have i been tired? hell yeah. i have a respect for the 80,000 lethal weapon i'm in control of. What wakes me up is i squeeze the hell out of the steering wheel, or will try pushing on either side of the steering wheel to bend it into an oval rather than a circle (doing this very carefully, mind you...and not with all my might, just enough to get the blood flowing)

Once i've reached that limit, i will pull off into a rest area or truck stop. My problem isnt seeing a mile marker 45 then five minutes later seeing 91. My problem is when i get tired, i can no longer estimate miles i've driven. I'll look and see mile marker 45, and when i THINK i've driven for 15 minutes and expect to see mile marker 60+....and the next yard stick is 50...then i know i'm getting tired.

I've ran up behind a few drivers who ride the rumble strips for quite a while. I will try getting them on the CB...or ill flash my brights at them to get their attention. After that, if i can pass them, i'll try passing them. I'm not going to stay behind them, so if they do overcorrect or something, i'm not in a position where i become part of the accident.

 

I am going through training this monday and I have fallen asleep at the wheel in my car! I think that it has happend to everyone at some point, but i think that I will never let it happen again. I just about hit a trucker when I came out of my dose from two days of staying awake. Scared the **** out of me. It was enough to keep me awake until I got home two hours later. I have done the same thing. I usually squeeze the steering wheel too. I will even bounce up and down on my seat too.

 

Back in the late '90's, before I got into trucking, I was behind a truck that suddenly slammed through a guardrail, down into the median, and up a slight embankment, and go airborn before dropping between overpasses, onto a small road below. The driver was alive when we managed to pull him away from what was left of his rig, but since I signed a witness statement saying I saw the accident, I got a call from a man who worked for the insurance company. He told me that the driver was no longer with us, which made me think the driver died.
Anyway, the man with the insurance company tried to get me to state on the recorded phone interview, that the state was at fault because they didn't have rumble strips in the area, so the driver fell asleep and had no idea he had left the roadway.
It is easy to say after the driver has died, to say he fell asleep. He's not there to admit or deny the charge. Luckily, the co-driver who was in the bunk asleep, made it with a few injuries.
So, don't let this be you. If I get so groggy that I can't go any farther, I will take the next exit, and take a nap. Even if it means risking a ticket, since they banned parking on exit/entrance ramps around here. But, it doesn't take a long nap for me to get over that groggy feeling.

BE SAFE! THINK OF OTHERS! THINK OF YOUR FAMILY! THINK OF YOURSELF!

 

Amen brother me too- I've done it many A night. I have had only two times cops ran me off. Texas, and Virginia....they dont mind cleaning up bodies I guess. In Tennessee it was bad one night, no room at the rest stop so went to next exit. TN state trooper, stopped got me up asked if I was on DOT I said no quick nap was feeling tired- he asked how long I'd be said about an hour he said have a good night, if I needed a place to take DOT go to weight station. Heck in TX I was in a weight station when he I got ran off!!

If these states would just get it into their heads- we dont mean nay harn in fact the opposite. All I ask is a place to pull off the road for a while. Set out some trash cans, and leave us alone..

 

Well are you sure there falling asleep??? I know when I drift it's usually when i'm TEXTING or doing something on my Phone!!

 

Yes fatigue is a job hazard for a truckers. To the driver who says he has never fallen asleep, I say yet! It just hasnt happened to you yet, and I pray that it never does. They funny thing about the body is that it is suicidal. Your brain knows that falling asleep behind the wheel can and often does result in death, yet when you get too tired it will put you to sleep.

The troublesome aspect is that you dont have control over it. We all know when we are tired and will in most cases call it a day/night and find somewhere to stop. The problem comes in when you have a distance that you NEED to make in order to meet the demands of the load. So you try to push on, after all its not that much further that we need to go..... We have all seen the results of these efforts. As we pass the wreck, everyone of us says a pray that whoever was in the vehicle is safe or at least will survive.

Anytime you choose some sort of activity such as trying to crush the steering wheel, you are beyond the limits of what you should be driving. You needed to have stopped an hour ago. Funny thing, at least for me, an hour ago, I felt fine, like I could drive for several more hours. But without realizing it fatigue hits me, and now I am struggling to stay with it long enough to make the next rest area or truck stop. If it gets too bad, the next exit (but with my luck it will be one of those that you cant get back on!).

Trip planning is a great concept and a task we all need to perform. Its just part of the job just like fueling the truck and checking the tires. All too often something beyond the driver's control forces a change in the plan, forces us to drive beyond the original plan, then we watch for the black dog.

 

lol... I think. I really hope that was sarcasm.

 

This becoming more and more of a problem all the time. There is no load or high enough pay worth leaving my wife and kids without there husband/dad or causing someone else to lose a loved one over. The truck stops are so full that you cannot hardly get a parking spot if it is even close to dark let alone at 10 or 11 pm at night. Indiana has started shutting down lots of the rest areas because of funds to run them and prostitution. They will even right you a ticket for parking on ramps also. If i'm tired i find somewhere to park regardless if i get a ticket or not. Lots of times I will find an exit that maybe has a shopping plaza or something and park. Yes lots of them say "NO TRUCKS" as well but I figure i'll be up and gone long before they get there so I don't worry about it. Just know your limits and be safe out there.