One Truckers
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One Truckers
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Driving a tractor trailer has given me quite a different perspective on
the highways of the USA over
the past few years
and I have noticed a change. Unfortunately it is not a change for
the better, but
rather a change
that is quite disturbing as it usually involves unnecessary death. Automobile
drivers are
compacting every
inch of our highways with an "only me" attitude leaving car pools behind
as just another
good idea we haven't
learned to incorporate in our lifestyles yet. Along with becoming
more aggressive,
road rage, and
a very obvious lack of knowledge about what is really on the roads,
is a serious recipe
for instant and
sometimes horrific death for all drivers on the road.
The
rate of new truck drivers are also growing at an astonishing rate
as supply and demand grow. Big
companies are hiring
new drivers fresh out of school and slapping them on the road in as little
as three
weeks in some areas.
These
same companies are lowering their rate of pay to new drivers and forcing
all drivers to over
extend their abilities.
Laws are in effect to prohibit over extension but for the most part any
driver
with a need to
make a few more bucks can find a way around these laws even if it means
breaking a few
more laws to do
so. Any attempt of the states or government to enforce these laws
are met with harsh
ridicule by the
majority of the truckers as like those written to enforce speeds on all
our highways for
all vehicles.
I am
sure your not taking what I am saying with good heart, but mind you, this
is just my observation
and I am not an
activist for the legal system or a goody two shoes. I am just making
an attempt to
inform those who
read this of my observations and with a few common sense suggestions hopefully
I may
save a life, if
not my own.
Most
young drivers in four wheelers are only knowledgeable about how many wheels
are on an eighteen
wheeler, but how
many of them know what it takes to stop one, how much it may weigh
or what kind of
damage it can do
even at a low rate of speed? Actually most new truck drivers learn
all this but I can
bet (hopefully
on no ones life) that they have no real comprehension as to what it takes
to stop an 80,000
pound truck at
55 miles an hour let alone at 75 miles an hour which by the way,
I see the latter speeds
more often than
not and even on slightly wet roads. I believe there ought to be in
effect some sort of
training for all
drivers to understand what it is they are really facing out there every
time they get in a
vehicle and speed
off onto the road.
Your highway friend and fellow Trucker
Bill, aka (Stonewall)
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