Question for all Experienced Drivers

Thank you for reinforcing my point that there are different types of trucks, and that you cannot use the same scope to judge a wreck involving an OTR truck as you do to judge a special purpose truck. In my case, the 2 state troopers who witnessed the wreck obviously didn't think I did anything wrong...they never even asked to see my drivers license, the tow truck's insurance paperwork, or anything else. A tow truck pulling onto the shoulder to pick up a car for the state police has every right to be traveling slow and even allows for the use of the center median to make a u-turn (responding to a police call on the interstate makes the tow truck one of the "authorized vehicles" referred to on those no u-turn signs). If you rear end a tow truck, it is your fault.

Now those mega-carrier trucks that pull over onto the shoulder to check their qualcomm is another story. If you happened to rear end one of them as they were pulling over or trying to get back up to speed, they would get a ticket for obstructing traffic.

The difference is that one truck has a job to do which requires it to stop on the shoulder in order to remove another potential hazard from the shoulder. The other truck has no real need to stop on the side of the highway.

A person died. That person could have survived if they had been wearing a seat belt. That person could have survived if the driver hadn't been speeding. That person could have survived if the driver hadn't been distracted/impaired. And yes, that person wouldn't have died if a garbage truck hadn't pulled out.

What so many here aren't quite grasping, though, is that if the road was clear when the truck pulled out (he didn't see anybody coming...same standard used by his harshest critics), and the car was traveling at such a high rate of speed that it closed the distance between the point where it first would have been visible to the truck and the location of the crash in less time than it takes for the truck to accelerate clear of the intersection, there wasn't a #### thing anybody driving that truck could have done to prevent the crash. It was the ultimate stroke of bad luck...and somebody who made the conscious decision not to buckle up made it worse by being the ONLY person in the vehicle to perish. Should a guy's career really come to an end just because he happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time?

 

Or how about your driving home from work on the freeway which is 70mph but its snowing so you are running 35mph and I am in my big rig running the speed limit of 70mph and smoke your ### end and you burn up in the car and die. Now by your reasoning YOU WOULD BE AT FAULT since you were on a freeway impeded the flow of traffic? Get real man people like you don't make any sense trying to communicate with the general public.

 

Too much we don't know about the accident.

This one could be it.

http://www.kltv.com/story/20340539/police-considering-charges-in-wreck-that-killed-east-texas-woman

 

So now I'm a hypocrite? LOL

Name calling = when someone realizes they are loosing an argument. That's alright. I wouldn't work for ignorant employers, so you wouldn't need to worry about me applying.

Anyway you wouldn't need to worry about me applying as I'm quite happy where I'm at. I brought that up to prove a point, which that point went well over your head.

 

The discussion is getting mean for sure. Sounds like a CB chat. A couple of things are facts. I notice that the responding police officers cited the OP, and that citation was valid and uncontested. There's a reason for that. He was at fault. Those police officers are trained accident investigators, and in every traffic fatality they do a full crime scene investigation. Also, the driver of the van was travelling at a high rate of speed, we can assume that to be a fact, and that the deceased was not restrained. These things make little difference to the cause of the event. Professional drivers are trained to maintain a high level of skill and safety, and we're trained to expect anything from other drivers. And we should drive that way. The OP knew this was a dangerous intersection before making that turn. The guy shows little remorse other than his own loss of income. That doesn't matter much, really: he didn't pull out thinking he'd cause a fatality. He just got the worst case event as a result of his choice to make that turn. It doesn't matter that he was driving a right hand vehicle, he did that as a regular part of his job anyway, and any drive would have put his vehicle in the intersection. We weren't there, that's a good thought to consider, but the police were, and they cited the trash truck driver. They didn't cite the van driver. For me, that fact and the OP's (and his company) acceptance of the citation are the most meaningful parts. Driving a truck is tough work, and bad things happen to good people all the time, but time it looks (from here, and I wasn't there either) like the OP was clearly at fault, and will have to find another way to use his CDL. Either that or find something else to support his family. I'm really glad this discussion isn't about me, because I know I've made my share of mistakes, trusted other drivers to see me and respond appropriately, and overall had a lot of luck keeping me out of nasty events like the OP experienced. I couldn't even begin to count all the close calls I've had, seen, or heard about. Some luck? Sometimes lots of luck.

 

One more fact:

Some members in this forum don't care about a fatality. They don't care about felony and drug convictions either. In their 'real world' everyone learns from their 'mistakes' and is trustworthy enough out of prison to drive a 80,000 LB truck cross-country. Who cares if you made a 'mistake' that killed someone? It's never the truck drivers fault. It's no big deal, keep on driving, brother.

 

That's about right.Sad isn't it.Don't think they'd act too forgving if it was their family or a close friend.Some on here are quick not to judge but when the offender isn't willing to fight this and clear his name what else we spose to think.

 

Agreed. All we can do is speculate.

 

true because classic could'nt take the heat and like that unfortunate day he's not on here setting us straight.Just walk away from everything.

 

This is what I'm talking about. A fatality is no big deal, right? To all you guys who backed the OP: maybe you should think twice before jumping the gun making yourself look foolish. No company will hire the OP when he still has a pending investigation.