STRAYCAT’S DOGGONE BLOG

THE LOAD FROM HELL

December 31, 1969 on 5:00 pm | In Rants | No Comments

August 6th (Friday): Delivered the load (from Brigham City, UT) at the “consignee” in Brownsville, TX this AM. The Planner gave me a load that picked up at the Laredo, TX Terminal going to Hayward, CA (201 miles empty, 1725 miles loaded). The route for today was US-83 north to Laredo, I-35 north to US-83 north to Carriizo Springs, TX. Then US-277 west through Eagle Pass, TX to Del Rio, TX. From Del Rio, US-90 west to Sanderson, TX, then US-285 north to Fort Stockton, TX. As it turned out this was “THE LOAD FROM HELL”!! I arrived in Laredo, picked up the paperwork for the load, and went out to hook-up to the trailer. I coundn’t find it anywhere in the yard. I finally found it in the Shop. They were installing new brake shoes. I finally got hooked to the trailer some 3 hours later. (the Shop has their priorities, & I have mine. They just happened to “collide” on this day). The “laden weight” of the load was 45,354 lbs (quite heavy, but “do-able” if the trailer was properly loaded). I was full of fuel (being the dutiful little trucker that I am, I had fueled upon entering the Terminal). Anyway, I went to the scale in the yard and weighed the load. It was legal according to that scale. Not being a trusting soul, I departed the terminal and went to the Pilot Truckstop and decided that a “certified” weight was needed. I scaled the load there, went inside to pay the fee and get my weight ticket. They couldn’t find it. (must have been a language problem. I speak & understand English, they didn’t). Sooooo, I fight my way through all the traffic in the truckstop and 15 minutes later am back on the scale. The lady takes my company and truck information again. I find another parking spot, go inside, and they CAN’T FIND MY TICKET, AGAIN. At this point, I “inform” her (using more colorful and less urbane language) that, compared to her, FORREST GUMP was a genius, and trace her lineage clear back to LASSIE. Anyway, I leave the truckstop in disgust, and “sans” a certified weight ticket. Between Carrizo Springs and Eagle Pass (about 20 miles form Eagle Pass), I have a tire “blow-out” on the left, inboard, forward axle of the trailer. I “limp” into Eagle Pass and call the company for help. This went relatively smoothly, considering the kind of day i’ve had so far. Swift has a network of hundreds of shops that they can call when a driver has mechanical problems on the road. Fortunately, there was a tire shop available right there in Eagle Pass. A half hour later the guy shows up with a new tire and has me ready to roll within a half hour of his arrival. Total time lost about 1.5 hours including getting a bite to eat & walking the doggies. I then continued my “slog” to Fort Stockton with no further problems.
August 7th (Saturday): Continuing the “saga” of the “trip from Hell”. The planned route for today was I-10 east through El Paso,TX; Las Cruses and Lordsburg, NM; into Arizona through Benson and Tucson and into Phoenix. The best laid plans of mice and men, however, are often thwarted by fate. I arrived at the El Paso Terminal at noon. I filled up with fuel, then (as an afterthought) decided to scale the load again. It was a “good thing”,because, sure enough, I was illegal (500 lbs overweight on the “steer axle” and 1700 lbs over on the “drive axles”) with no way to make any adjustments to the weight other than re-working the load. Had I entered the “port of entry” into New Mexico being that far overweight, I would have got a hefty ticket, and spent the week-end in my truck there until I cound get help on Monday. I went into the office and told them of my plight. They said to go to the truckstop (10 miles away) and get a certified weight, then come back in to see them. I did so (with considerably less effort than yesterday). I told them that the load was, in fact, illegal by about the same weights as mentioned above,and the load had to be re-worked. I asked if the shop could help me. They said that the shop did not work weekends and wouldn’t be in until Monday AM. I asked if they had a key to the shop so that I could use the forklift and re-work the load myself and continue on my way. They said that they had no access to the shop at all. I called my “home Terminal” (Salt Lake City, UT). My driver manager happened to be the “driver manager du jour” for the week-end. After some research, he said that Arizona allows 20,00 lbs on the steer-axle, so if i could “slide the weight forward on the 5th wheel, it would move all the excess weight to the steer-axle and the drives (drive-axles) would then be legal and I could proceed to Phoenix and re-work the load there (where the shop doesn’t have “bankers hours”). I succeeded in moving the weight and got the drives legal (but just barely). I then asked him about New Mexico’s regulations. New Mexico does not specify a legal weight for the steer-axles. He said that he didn’t know and to use my judgement as to whether I should try to proceed with the “plan”. Being the cautious type I decided that the best plan of action was to call the New Mexico Port of Entry and find out their interpretation of “not specified”. Another “good thing”. The officer at the Port said that the maximum allowable weight was 12000 lbs, and they would write a citation for anything overweight. End of that “plan”. Satan 3, Ernie 0. I called my driver manager back & told him the bad news. The load that was to deliver Monday, would still be in El Paso awaiting re-work, and would have to be re-scheduled (despite my Herculean efforts).
August 9th(Monday): Still on “the load from Hell”. The planned route for this day was I-10 west through Phoenix, AZ, then on into Blythe,CA. This AM, I checked in with the EL Paso Terminal. They informed me that the “yard manager” had not showed up yet, and that I should check with the shop to see if they could help. I did so. When I told them what the problem was, they looked at me like I had just asked them to “throw their puppy into a wood-chipper”. I got no help there. Back to the Drivers Window I went, and not a ‘happy camper’. I asked to see the Terminal Manager. He “shined me on” for about 1 1/2 hours. (He was in his office less than 20 feet away with his door open and fully aware that I was waiting to see him). I finally got tired of that. I elevated my vocal timbre by about 50% and asked what the *&# I had to do to get him to come talk to me about the problem. That got his attention. He came out of his office, obviously not pleased with the disturbance, and the verbal “fisticuffs” began. We traced each others lineage, he inferring that I was decended from the above mentioned LASSIE, and I inferring that he was “unaware of the identity of his paternal parent, and that he suffered from an Odephus complex ( again using the more colorful and less urbane language, much to the amusement of those in the office and the Drivers Lounge as well). He said that he didn’t have time to be dealing with drivers’ “petty complaints”. I said: ” I’ve been here for almost 48 hours waiting to get this load re-worked and that you can either find someone to help me re-work the load, or T-call it and get me on my way with something else, but that you are going to make for time this drivers ” petty complaint”, or that my next phone call would be to the Company President. Before the situation could deteriorate much further, the Yard Manager (who had been at the doctor passing a Kidney Stone) came in and said that he would help me. FINALLY. We had to pull every pallet out of the trailer and re-load it. Since the pallets were similar in weight and number to those of a beverage load, we decided to use the same load plan as a beverage load. Worked like a charm, and I was finally en-route once more. I do not suffer incompetance nor incompetants well, and this place is rife with both. I guess i’m “persona non gratis” in El Paso terminal for a while. Tsk, tsk. tsk. Anyway the rest of the day went well.
August 10th (Tuesday): Still on the Devil Load. The route today was. I-10 west to I-210 west (to avoid the LA grid-lock) to I-5 north to Santa Nella. All went well.
August 11th (Wednesday): The Hell Load is history. It deliverd at 0900 this AM and good ridance. All I had to do was navigate the 70 or so miles from Santa Nella to Hayward, through the Bay Area “rush hour” traffic without killing any “bone-headed” California drivers. (Why do they call it “rush hour” when no-one is moving)? The route is I-5 north to I-580 west to I-880 south to Hayward. Yes, I finally arrived without incident and made the delivery on time (for the re-scheduled appointment), but “par for the course”, there was no freight available. The Planners did eventually find me a load, but it didn’t pick up until the next day, so I just headed to the Lathrop, CA terminal and “kicked back”.