Stupid husband

You don't know any of that?

I thought you were a safety person at a company?

By the way, I don't think it was mentioned, there is a HUGE difference between an accident and an incident. as the OP has disclosed, this is an incident, not an accident and as I mentioned, there is more to the story than is being told.

 

my thinking is that the company had a complaint or 2 about this guy, maybe his co driver/student, OR others he has driven with, and that nailed him finally.

but then why too, wasn't he tested on previous occasions, unless the company just did not believe the complaints against him.??

 

I don't know, I assume that he was a screw up and there was more than a mirror involved, maybe a hood or a car that was hit. I don't know, the OP needs to fill us in if she can but right now I am a pessimist about it, don't need advice other than he needs to find a job somewhere else.

 

We haven't had any accidents or incidents since I have been here and no one has ever even brought the subject up to me. I don't deal in the insurance. I am the safety person here. Like I've said, I'm 100% new to the industry and mainly focused on learning what the last auditor told me my job duties were. I'm not afraid to admit what I don't know. Guess that will be added to my summer reading list.

(I would also like to mention that there wasn't much of a system for the position they are developing for me. It was all given over to the 3rd party auditor and his company before I came along. In 4 months I think I have learned a lot.)

 

Without a doubt

Correct again, the OP appears to be looking for a band-aid approach rather than a solution to the core problem(s).

Consider that the OP's spouse is not being fully transparent with the OP as well.

The details are just conjecture on our part given the information available.

Just to muddy the waters of limited information, perhaps the gyro in the driver facing camera went off just as the driver and/or trainer were taking a big hit off of a bong!

 

Now I understand you a little better. Ive been wondering off line what's going on with you since the recent topic of a driver.

Let me preface my post by saying a moment that in the old days If I, the driver never had to see a Safety Boss in his or her office, it is good. Because the only time I have ever been inside one is for one of four reasons.

1- Get yelled at one way over something that happened. (I once ran a lawyer and her BMW onto the grass rather than roll the 20 foot box against a traffic screw up ahead of me for which I had no place to go near York PA on 83. There is a infamous curve within that highway about halfway there above Hunts Valley Maryland I believe. The situation happened and I was plumb out of room with that semi. She's loaded really heavy (Not good) and not maneuverable. And completely out of room before smashing cars when someone screwed up on that 45 mph speed curve. So I took the left lane as a way of buying time to not hit anyone and the lawyer next to me had no choice but to take the car onto the grass. (That is NOT a good thing at highway speed, and I think still better than being crushed by a big rig) In short no one had a choice that moment that morning, I think 30 cars 10 trucks and so on. It was a near thing.

The following day safety called me in and started yelling. When I tried to describe the situation I found myself in, it only added more fuel to his yelling (Situational Awareness lack of etc) so I learned to sit down, shut up and wait for mr big yell to wind out his system and get tired. That took a while.

2- There has been a violation of company policy and it's a place of punishment. It no longer matters what led up to the violation itself or what happened among the leadership of the company (Dispatcher) and me prior to that violation detected on the logbook or something else such as going home without permission for example. We are not there to recreate the problem and find the root cause. We are there to decide if I still have a job or not. And if so, what losses will be imposed in terms of suspension, docking payroll or introduction to really short hauling really bad loads no one wants for a period of time. As to have plenty of hours each week to where it's not possible to violate for a while.

3- It is not good to be around Safety some days at all. One morning FFE had a delivery of a number of Dallas major newspapers. On a whole page was one of our Peterbuilts which means President's fleet driver usually only given to 1, 2 3 or more million mile driver hall of fame type persons in senority, safety etc. Was a Pete with it's entire front ahead of the cab windshield chopped off. Engine, wheels, suspension, bumper, hood everything all gone. In the middle of absolute tumbleweed dirt no where flat arizona at a small tiny rail crossing known to contain really fast and major freight trains east and west through there.

I happened to remember that day because of the storm from Safety and all the people there that day. How such a thing could happen in a absolute absence of any man made anything except a pair of railroad tracks no one would understand. So it was way better to simply go up to Dispatch, find a load and get out of the Headquarters quick. Those kinds of storms among a stirred up department is equal to a hornet's nest. The possible fall out includes a company wide drug test of every soul in the building for example right now if they chose to do so.

4- In very rare cases. I emphasize the word rare as in once in a harvest moon or something, you might ask Safety to resolve a HOS conflict when dispatch tells you to violate it to go do something and you do not have the hours to do it and you would be fired if you did it, fined if caught by DOT doing it or worse fired by the saftey after it's all over because it would be yet another violation and potential service failure issues

At this point when ###### if you do and ###### if you don't you might call a safety man on the phone and explain to him or her whats the problem and spend some time waiting for that to be resolved within the company's leadership and dispatch either in your favor or against you or be called in for a converstation about how you have not apparently followed the training prescribed by the company in HOS logging or some other trifle that created this conflict.

I write this 4 sets of problems around Safety in a slight humor today because looking back on all those and more, I can smile because it was such a... tempest in a teapot at times and really serious at other times.

I knew that I would not make a good safety man myself and always wondered how in the world would they ever get some sleep at night if something big did come up. Such as life, death and lawsuits inbound etc.

The one problem I remember most of all the years is a set of Beef Tomatos from Holland via KLM airlines at Kennedy airport going to Norristown PA grocery distribution. These big tomatos were shipped under about 900 pounds of green peppers on one of 6 total pallets under a airline issued freight pallet net system. The Kennedy boss man of air freight told me to put my knife away (Big buck special.. and a large airport too no less in them days) and not disturb the product until it's loaded into my non air ride reefer trailer.

Why the company took this load without airride anything I don't know. When we got to norristown the next morning the tomatos were a complete loss. The heavy peppers on top made sure of that. Probably on the first 10 miles of really broken concrete coming out of Kennedy Airport Freight with a big truck.

The result was 3 payphones on my shoulders. One contained the entire trucking company, my bosses, OSD, safety etc, another phone contained the towers downtown in NYC (The same that were destroyed in 9-11) demanding payment for those lost tomatoes and a third was a non english overseas from Holland's shipper of tomatos asserting that they packed the tomatos on top of green peppers etc. So all three payphones made the entire situation untenable.

In addition Norristown had a suit standing over me and the precious phone going well? Who pays what how much and when for my lost tomatoes?

What I should have done was pulled over at the other side of the airport fence, break the seal and restack the stuff. And get a airride reefer or refuse the whole thing all together. But in that time there was insufficient experience in me because it was within my first year trucking and I knew nothing. And did nothing and when something did come up well guess what.

I know this post is rather long, divided into 4 reasons with a story each related to safety and a story related to losses due to things well above a driver's ability or control and so on. That's how I constructed this post.

At the end of the morning, having learned that Safety is best left alone in life not because of anything BAD being done (There is plenty of that from the entire fleet and dispatchers every day, every hour) but it's best that they are left alone. Especially when they are enduring difficult times of lawsuits, requested information from Law Investagators, DOT problems potentially threatening the entire Business itself and so on. Safety people have a way of not doing well in these times.

That is to say you cannot be nice and say hello or make friends as you pass through looking for a load, but there are times it's not really a good place to be in this industry.

 

When I started, our drivers HATED our 3 party safety and auditor. He would yell at them and make himself look stupid on a regular basis. I am always asking our drivers questions. (When our dispatcher is out I also have to fill in for her.) I've never once yelled at them, never once picked on petty situations or even picked. I just go over stuff with them, advise of any new findings in regs, answer questions when they have them and then (what I assume) normal safety stuff. They call me if they need help and they call me when they think a situation might arise. I've worked here since December but I kind of took it upon myself to learn the regs. They didn't really ask me to, however, I wanted to understand as much as I could. I then joined this forum, talked a lot with the drivers and joined OOIDA. Yesterday I talked to my husband about getting my class A to help with our pick ups locally. He thought I was nuts but then when I advised it could potentially help out the company, our drivers and me having a better understanding, then he thought it was a good idea. (Whether it actually is or not, I have no idea.)

 

Tell your Husband there were 4 women in our class of 22 of a variety of ages and walks of life in trucking school back in the 80's Some had trouble with well... in those days it was much more non PC and not sanitized as it is today. However, they did very well, all got licenses and I spotted three of them over time doing work in trucking as they passed by and doing well.

My first trainer happened to be female and in a male dominated company in those days she had to be exceptional. (And was as a professional trucker and trainer to boot) We had at that time a number of drivers who had what we call PTSD now from Vietnam and to do some of the things they did day in and day out for them was a form of relief from stress. So part of my training was being told not to do this or that with a 18 wheeler. It will roll over on you as some of these vets roared by well over the speed limit.

There is one other thing I wanted to point out. Usually a company contains people who held a Class A in those days or hold a CDL etc today. And it is good they do that within the office staff because they have actually done at least something we drivers have done in the same company with the same shippers and recievers etc. Not necessarily everywhere. If you held a CDL and had to endure some of the things imposed on drivers within your company, Im pretty certain you will very quickly discover points of failure in your entire company structure and begin to apply remedies before you lose too many people or have too many damage or losses.

I will say this one time. This is not something I say often. And it is not being troll or provoking. It's a thought.

"It is really hard to take orders from a dispatcher who does not hold a CDL, thinks trucking is two inches wide on the map of Wyoming USA in the deepest of winter storms and wonders why in the world it's so hard to drive that little bit."

You follow me? So, going through the process of getting a CDL etc especially in today's real ID act of 2020 combined with the enhanced licensing, fastpass etc (Keep your taxes paid up, IRS has begun to revoke 326,000 non payers who owe 50K or more of passports and fast pass as of this month) makes you more able to be in a position among drivers in particular and staff sometimes where you do understand and have done some of the things we have to do.

 

Hubs is a big hoss of a man standing 6'2 and 250lbs (navy vet to boot) and he said a lot of his worry is because of my size. (I'm 5'5" maybe 5'6" and 130lbs.) I also advised him that intrastate isn't that bad.

 

I get what you are saying, it is great you're here asking, however as a fleet owner, I would think that drug related knowledge is part of your job, even understanding how insurance works should be part of it. Just keep learning.