Diary of a Truck Driver

Last week was a holiday, of sorts. You always end up working too hard when you stay home for the week but at least all those nagging jobs get caught up with.

So last night I climbed into a clean, serviced and polished truck (thanks guys, she looks and runs a treat) and headed for Ol’ Sydney Town.

Around about 2am as I was running along the freeway behind another truck (plenty of space between us) a taxi comes hammering along beside us in lane two. As he clears the nose of the leading truck he dives across his bow without warning, over the white hashed no-go area at the exit and shoots off toward Somersby (or somewhere, I forget which exit it was). The truck had to swerve to miss him so I called him up on the two-way and asked “are you awake yet?” to which the reply came “bloody idiot certainly caught my attention!”. Well done to the truck driver as he could have ended up with a sliding rig but kept it all together.

I made it into town and got my first drop done by about 5am and headed out past the airport… the screech of brakes made me quickly scan the mirror only to find a car trying to merge under my trailer. I swung the trailer and watched the car get bumped out of the way by my triaxle group. Hazards on and I stopped where I was to find out if the drive was okay.

“Sorry mate” he said, “I don’t know what happened”; “You tried to merge with my trailer”, I replied. “Yeah, my lane just ended and I didn’t know what to do”, he said innocently. Slow down would have been a better move but he looked like he’d just climbed out of bed. Oh well, truck undamaged, car still driveable although not looking quite so good with Michelin scribed up the crumpled door in black smudged letters and the driver didn’t appear any less useful than before. “Sorry for holding you up” he said with a wave.

And they reckon no-one is dieing to get into trucks anymore!

I just wanted to send a quick hello to the guy in the black Yaris (sorry Cath but it was a Yaris) who decided to pop out in front of me from the left hand side of my bull-bar and fill the small margin of safety I had left in front in reasonably heavy traffic and please excuse my use of the air horn and any distress it may have invoked.

I sounded the horn to let you know that what you had done was a little on the silly side of careful driving. It wasn’t meant to invoke your demonstration of how sore your middle finger is. I couldn’t care less about your sore finger and I’m guessing you hurt it when you broke the indicator stalk on your vehicle as they weren’t working at all.

What I really wanted to get across is that I don’t know you or your family but I care enough about your well-being not to have to fill out the paperwork as the fire brigade hose you legacy off the road and the hours of delay that such an incident would invoke to other more competent road users trying to get home for the weekend.

I can’t get my point across strongly enough about your sore finger either. I did look at it and I did think to myself all sorts of places to put it to make it feel better and you shouldn’t have held it out the window so long for all to see because I think that’s why you nearly ran into the back of the B-Double in front of you when he stopped suddenly.

Once again… I’m really sorry, honest!

If I had to count the number of cars I see in a day I’d run out of fingers really quickly. If I counted the number of cars I’ve passed in the last six months, having done more than 100,000 kilometres, I think my head would turn into a singularity much to Steven Hawkins’ disgust.

The ones that stand out are usually the really bad drivers but the other day, whilst I was climbing over the top of the Moonbi range I was struck my the good driving habits being displayed by two small motor homes. They were using their UHF radios to communicate and keeping at eat a truck length apart whilst maintaining a constant speed never exceeding 90 kph. They were a delight to go past, slipping past one with plenty of throttle left and ducking into the tailor made gap between them before doing it all again for the lead vehicle. Thanks guys, top job. Let’s hope this catches on with the caravan mob.

Another vehicle I passed on the same trip was a small camper van. They tried to do the right thing and god bless them for trying but they got it all wrong. As I followed them for a while, knowing there wasn’t a suitable place to pass for quite some time they took the initiative and kept hesitating on the accelerator and ducking left onto the shoulder. It wasn’t safe enough so I would go but instead kept ending up too close to them for safety. Finally the opportunity presented itself and out and about I went. They tried to do the right thing again and eased off, which was good but they ducked to the left again onto the shoulder. Sound helpful but they vanished from my mirrors meaning I had to stay out in the oncoming lane until I could get a visual on them.

Maintain you speed, don’t panic and keep doing whatever you’re doing and let us work out the tough stuff.

Unfortunately the good impression of small vehicle drivers was tarnished by the idiot that overtook me on a double lane going down the Cunning ham Gap. The view from the helipad would be awesome but you won’t see much from inside a body bag (I can guarantee that as I’ve been zipped in one before) not to mention the damage to your little green Mazda sports car.

Whilst I’m on the topic of stupid drivers, five points goes to the representative of the constabulary in the Quirind car that overtook me, after one previously aborted attempt, whilst I was up on the limiter (103 kph approx) in a 100 kph zone. He would have to have been doing at least 110 kph and we were on a newly surfaced section of road. Visibility was good but is this the example we want to display to the road users. You’ve got POLICE written all over your car and you’re doing the wrong thing. If it’s urgent, go code red, otherwise obey the rules you uphold.

Finally, a couple of tips for all the mums and dads poking around the highways and byways of our great nation during these school holidays. I understand you’re out of your comfort zone so please understand when I curse at you…

Step 1: On the side of the road you will see a sign with a number inside a red ring. The number always ends in zero to keep it simple. Remember this number.

Step 2: Now look at you speedo and locate this number or a lower one.

Step 3: Use the accelerator (on the far right) and the brake (middle in a manual, left in an auto) to make the orange stick thingy line up with the number. Please use the pedals one at a time!

Step 4: Maintain the orange stick thingy in the chosen position even if a truck comes along side and you feel compelled to use accelerator only.

Follow these few simple steps and you’ll have a great day.

Safe driving and remember to keep it shiny side up.

Yesterday was a bit of a rest day. A rest from driving a least although I worked my back side off catching up with jobs at home. I finally fell into bed after another 24 hours awake and slept from 8pm until 3am when the alarm signalled the start of another run to Sydney.

My first two drops for the day were marred by an inaccurate load plan and a poorly loaded trailer. I struggled to find the location of the correct pallets for each delivery but finally got it all sorted although my load was now filled with empty pallet spaces which makes for a nasty load if you have to break suddenly. I hope this wouldn’t be an issue…

As I ran down a slight hill toward the tunnel that runs under the Sydney Airport runway, I took my right foot off the accelerator and allowed the truck to coast on the jakes. As I approached the slowing vehicle in front I attempted to apply the brake only to find my foot was firmly attached to the base of my seat. In a quick moment of panic and unable to kick my right foot free I used my left foot to apply the break (having had to visibly locate the brake pedal for my left foot!), the old left foot is a bit of a bafoon and a real ham fist when it comes to braking and the truck hesitated abruptly. I managed to slip my shoe of and regain normal operation of the controls. Upon further examination I found that a spring from the underside of my seat had hooked itself in the little pull tab on the back of my boot thus securing it firmly to the seat base. I’ve now cut the loops on both of my boots so it can’t happen again.

Then at my last drop off as I approached the address on the paperwork I didn’t like the look of the entry so I pulled up and went for a walk to check it out. The owner assured me that all was good and semi-trailers come in and out all the time without a problem. I wasn’t overly confident but chose to go in having seen that I could indeed get myself out when required.

The driveway was a steep drop with a right hand turn as soon as you are through the gate. I knew I ran the risk of the trailer hitting against the cab at the top and that the guards over the drive tyres could scrub on the trailer so I eased her in very slowly. Bugger!… one of the guards managed to hook up on the I-beam under the trailer and bent itself beyond use. I had to borrow a crowbar and a forklift to straighten everything out enough to stop the guard from scrubbing on the tyre. Oh well that guard was almost two weeks old now.

This is the yard in question and I’ve overlayed a truck to give an idea of the scale.