I remember an incident on a job site were a new, fill-in foreman needed a load of D1 on a airport job in lower Kuskokwim Delta. I happened to be wearing a Teamster cap. The conversation went something like this: "Jump in that belly dump and fetch the blade a load of D-1." (with a strong Texas accent)
"Sir, I am the Surveyor and dont really know how to drive a 18 speed belly dump. Well hell, you're a Teamster arent you boy? Yes sir. Then do what I say and fetch that blade some D-1. I finally figured out how to start the damn thing and found a gear that made it move forward. Apparently to the mechanics dislike I did not take off the trailer brakes and was dragging the rear tires accross the ramp. He came roaring up in his shiny new Peterbuilt (fresh off the Barge)complete with all kinds of little lights and chrome doohickeys all over it. (see where this is going?) After a chewing from the mechanic on my truck driving abilities, he reached up and pushed the trailer release and slammed the door. Im really feeling like a trucker now. I get it moving, start cracking the wheel to the left and reach for another gear. I feel this shuttering and thought perhaps it was my amateur gear shifting but by golly that blade (who had been ripping out all my 18" hubs on a 20'grid all week was going to get his' D-1). I had the entire front clip of that new mechanic's Peterbuilt strewn all over the tarmac. Somewhere in the 40 pages of incident reporting there was a question that asked "How do you feel this accident can best be advoided in the future? My answer: "Dont ask the Surveyor to drive the damn bellydump!" 😉
One time about 20 years ago me and the rodman (15 years older than me) show up at the jobsite. Even though I had explicitly explained the day before where equipment should be parked the water truck was sitting there parked on line between my two control points. Rodman said he would move the truck. He got in, took him about 5 minutes but he figured out how to move it the 10 feet we needed to get it out of our way. The contractor showed up about an hour later and didn't seem all that happy that we moved his water truck but what are you going to do?
Roadhand... I am half laughing to myself and half serious as I think about this, if we had that policy in place at my company there would be no limit to the amount of equipment that would get intentionally torn up.
Myself and all the foremen and other technical employees are on salary. The most highly valued commodity ever, lately, is a day of vacation. During the worst of the downturn we laid off half our staff. Now that we are back up to around 85% of our normal workload we all realized that there is no plan by management to re-hire any relief personnel.
I have just barely been able to squeeze out two days of vacation in the last four years, no exaggeration, totally serious. My average work week is 50 hours minimum. I am pretty sure you know the people I work for.
Accidents do happen.
Did he hit it hard enough to wake all seven people up in it? Just curious. 🙂
Accidents do happen.
😉
an old one from out on the West Coast:
Q. What's Orange and sleeps 5?
A. CalTrans Truck.