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Why so many 18 wheelers wadded up on i40?

bk2drvr

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I have noticed a significant increase in 18 wheelers that have either plowed through gaurd rails and ended up in the desert or in a river bed off the side of the road or the 53' behemiths in the sand in the center divider between the east and westbound lanes. What the hell is going on? I see this situation on over half my trips to the river. I travel this route about every 7-10 days. I assume its drivers falling asleep as they are usually single vehicle accidents. I can't imagine the ride when one of these occurs. If the driver lives through it they must have a several second out of body experience as they become awake. I saw one on Friday night heading east around Kelbaker where the truck plowed through the wood and steel guard rail and off into a riverbed below, probably a 20' elevation drop. The guard rail posts sheered off and the 1/8" thick steel folded into an accordion shape. On my return Monday afternoon another 53' footer in the sand in the center divider. That one looked clean but he had to have traveled nearly 300 yards before coming to a stop. CHP was on site and both of them standing out there looking at it?

Do these guys get fired after an incident like this? Again i'm seeing these frequently. Amazing...
 

thmterry

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The new breed of truck driver doesnt know shit about driving a truck. They dont know how to use mirrors, no more cb talk to keep traffic flowing (maybe because they dont speak good English) watching movies with feet on the dash while driving and the list goes on and on...............................
 

The Prisoner

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Actually I just was behind a student trucker from Mohave Community College. Said start driving in 4 weeks. Don’t know shit about driving those so I don’t know if that’s enough time or not.
 

The Prisoner

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I have noticed a significant increase in 18 wheelers that have either plowed through gaurd rails and ended up in the desert or in a river bed off the side of the road or the 53' behemiths in the sand in the center divider between the east and westbound lanes. What the hell is going on? I see this situation on over half my trips to the river. I travel this route about every 7-10 days. I assume its drivers falling asleep as they are usually single vehicle accidents. I can't imagine the ride when one of these occurs. If the driver lives through it they must have a several second out of body experience as they become awake. I saw one on Friday night heading east around Kelbaker where the truck plowed through the wood and steel guard rail and off into a riverbed below, probably a 20' elevation drop. The guard rail posts sheered off and the 1/8" thick steel folded into an accordion shape. On my return Monday afternoon another 53' footer in the sand in the center divider. That one looked clean but he had to have traveled nearly 300 yards before coming to a stop. CHP was on site and both of them standing out there looking at it?

Do these guys get fired after an incident like this? Again i'm seeing these frequently. Amazing...

I don't know how much it happens, but about a month ago, a big coyote shot across my bow just before Yucca at night, Didn't hit it but sure woke me the hell up!!! In a semi probably like hitting a chipmonk.
 

ONE-A-DAY

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I have noticed a significant increase in 18 wheelers that have either plowed through gaurd rails and ended up in the desert or in a river bed off the side of the road or the 53' behemiths in the sand in the center divider between the east and westbound lanes. What the hell is going on? I see this situation on over half my trips to the river. I travel this route about every 7-10 days. I assume its drivers falling asleep as they are usually single vehicle accidents. I can't imagine the ride when one of these occurs. If the driver lives through it they must have a several second out of body experience as they become awake. I saw one on Friday night heading east around Kelbaker where the truck plowed through the wood and steel guard rail and off into a riverbed below, probably a 20' elevation drop. The guard rail posts sheered off and the 1/8" thick steel folded into an accordion shape. On my return Monday afternoon another 53' footer in the sand in the center divider. That one looked clean but he had to have traveled nearly 300 yards before coming to a stop. CHP was on site and both of them standing out there looking at it?

Do these guys get fired after an incident like this? Again i'm seeing these frequently. Amazing...
Netflix
 

Water Romper

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My guess is, these guys and gals are "running on empty" due to Covid. Cant get product moved fast enough, shortage of drivers so they "cook the books" driving well past the allotted legal daily hours. Its the almighty dollar and all they see is green, regardless the fact they are driving numb, jacked on caffeine, red bull and the illegal stuff.

Its a tuff job and boring as hell...
 

yard dog

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My guess is, these guys and gals are "running on empty" due to Covid. Cant get product moved fast enough, shortage of drivers so they "cook the books" driving well past the allotted legal daily hours. Its the almighty dollar and all they see is green, regardless the fact they are driving numb, jacked on caffeine, red bull and the illegal stuff.

Its a tuff job and boring as hell...
[/QUOTE


No more log books there are exemptions but for the most drivers it’s on board electronic logging devices no cheating with those and also can be tracked from scale house to scale house with your pre pass .
 

Water Romper

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No more log books there are exemptions but for the most drivers it’s on board electronic logging devices no cheating with those and also can be tracked from scale house to scale house with your pre pass .


Tells you how much I know about truckers. All I know is I couldn't do it, I get drowsy driving from the house to the grocery store , and that's 2 miles. here in Idaho, they pull Triple's, (3 trailers) amazing to see the trailers looking like a fish going up stream at 70 mph. Wouldn't get me doing that, Kudos to these folks for bringing home the groceries!
 

78Southwind

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The new breed of truck driver doesnt know shit about driving a truck. They dont know how to use mirrors, no more cb talk to keep traffic flowing (maybe because they dont speak good English) watching movies with feet on the dash while driving and the list goes on and on...............................
Pretty close, it's driving with feet while eating and watching a movie.

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78Southwind

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I saw one in the ditch earlier and now I have been sitting here for about an hour. Thank goodness for a large Del Taco cup, RDP and SXM.
20210608_171636.jpg


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fmo24

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It’s crazy out on the highways. We travel full time and I have seen some shit. Internet has to be a very bad influence on current fleet of drivers. They all seem to be busy on phone or computer when I see them
 

Blackmagic94

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My guess is, these guys and gals are "running on empty" due to Covid. Cant get product moved fast enough, shortage of drivers so they "cook the books" driving well past the allotted legal daily hours. Its the almighty dollar and all they see is green, regardless the fact they are driving numb, jacked on caffeine, red bull and the illegal stuff.

Its a tuff job and boring as hell...


i have a CDL but I drive 12-24 trips a year at most for my job

You can’t “cook” the books with an electronic log book.

bad drivers
Texting
Or the truck just being an asshole

If your back trailers tires hit the edge of the highway it’s a white knuckle event to counter it out without getting sucked off the road
 

HALLETT BOY

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That and all the Motorhome burn spots on the shoulder
 

spectra3279

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From what I see, it's guts under very tight delivery dates and times. They are pushing themselves and their company is pushing them also. You can't drive 10 hours a day 7 days a week without a break.

We have a 14 hour clock that we can work in, then during that 14 hours you can drive a total of 11 hours. Then all this has to fall into a 70 hour clock during a 7 day period. Once your out of hours in the 14 or 11 hour clock, you have to take a 10 hour rest break. If you run out of the 70 hour clock before the 7 days, you have to take a 34 hour break.

Now if you limit yourself to 10 hours aday, on the eight day you can regain 10 hours from the day that rolled off. This is called a recap. Most guys will run on this so they don't have to have a 34 hour rest. By doing this you don't sleep all that great so your always tired.

And then there is swift.

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Cobalt232

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Maybe I have not noticed it before, but what is the black fuzzy thing with fuzzy balls that they tie to their rearview mirror?
 

azsunfun

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From what I see, it's guts under very tight delivery dates and times. They are pushing themselves and their company is pushing them also. You can't drive 10 hours a day 7 days a week without a break.

We have a 14 hour clock that we can work in, then during that 14 hours you can drive a total of 11 hours. Then all this has to fall into a 70 hour clock during a 7 day period. Once your out of hours in the 14 or 11 hour clock, you have to take a 10 hour rest break. If you run out of the 70 hour clock before the 7 days, you have to take a 34 hour break.

Now if you limit yourself to 10 hours aday, on the eight day you can regain 10 hours from the day that rolled off. This is called a recap. Most guys will run on this so they don't have to have a 34 hour rest. By doing this you don't sleep all that great so your always tired.

And then there is swift.

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then in az you have dps to contend with:mad:,
 

H20 Toie

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Electronic log books have made things worse i think, if you speed at all it shows. it use to be if you wanted to pass another truck your just put down then hammer and blew by , now you can't go over certain speed or it shows on the log, so say the truck you want to pass is going 53 you can only go a couple of miles an hour faster so now it takes few minutes to get by. as you are slowly going by you now are side by side for a lot longer, any wind, bump in the road, etc is a problem. not a whole lot of room for error on some of the roads, drop one tire off the shoulder and its mister toads wild ride.
 

spectra3279

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Electronic log books have made things worse i think, if you speed at all it shows. it use to be if you wanted to pass another truck your just put down then hammer and blew by , now you can't go over certain speed or it shows on the log, so say the truck you want to pass is going 53 you can only go a couple of miles an hour faster so now it takes few minutes to get by. as you are slowly going by you now are side by side for a lot longer, any wind, bump in the road, etc is a problem. not a whole lot of room for error on some of the roads, drop one tire off the shoulder and its mister toads wild ride.
That's from the engine being governed. The biggest issue is if you run outa time you have to stop. Doesn't matter where you are.

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H20 Toie

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That's from the engine being governed. The biggest issue is if you run outa time you have to stop. Doesn't matter where you are.

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No over the road trucks are governed at 55 . speed is recorded the whole time, when you are out of ca trucks don't have the 55mph limit. but if you speed its logged and with some companies thats a no no. plus the po po can check now, but yes you can only drive certain amount of hours
 

FlyByWire

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I could write a fucking book on this one.

I drove over the road in another life, and I’ll say that the industry as a whole has completely changed in the last 10-15 years. And I’ll leave it at that.
 

The Prisoner

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Electronic log books have made things worse i think, if you speed at all it shows. it use to be if you wanted to pass another truck your just put down then hammer and blew by , now you can't go over certain speed or it shows on the log, so say the truck you want to pass is going 53 you can only go a couple of miles an hour faster so now it takes few minutes to get by. as you are slowly going by you now are side by side for a lot longer, any wind, bump in the road, etc is a problem. not a whole lot of room for error on some of the roads, drop one tire off the shoulder and its mister toads wild ride.
That explains why I see more of them passing in the left lane and clogging shit up. And on top
of that they aren’t going hardly any faster than the trucks they are passing. Just causing a shit show behind them.
 

2Driver

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Drove the 10 to Temecula from Phx last weekend. I have never seen so many trucks. About every 10th truck was an Amazon truck. Saw several drifting onto the shoulder then veering back, cell phone between their face and the wheel.

Many of the tractors pulling Amazon trailers were pretty tired looking rigs.
 

78Southwind

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Finally got to Needles. The tanker was buckled and leaking.
20210608_180124.jpg


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Blackmagic94

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Electronic log books have made things worse i think, if you speed at all it shows. it use to be if you wanted to pass another truck your just put down then hammer and blew by , now you can't go over certain speed or it shows on the log, so say the truck you want to pass is going 53 you can only go a couple of miles an hour faster so now it takes few minutes to get by. as you are slowly going by you now are side by side for a lot longer, any wind, bump in the road, etc is a problem. not a whole lot of room for error on some of the roads, drop one tire off the shoulder and its mister toads wild ride.


news to me and I have a cdl. My truck is limited to 70 mph because of company policy. ADOT don’t give AF about that
 

Blackmagic94

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No over the road trucks are governed at 55 . speed is recorded the whole time, when you are out of ca trucks don't have the 55mph limit. but if you speed its logged and with some companies thats a no no. plus the po po can check now, but yes you can only drive certain amount of hours

Never has that issue in California.
 

brgrcru

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Cellphones and semi's don't mix...

Either do 4 wheelers and phones

My observation
75 % of 4 wheelers are distracted driving .
Not that 18 wheelers are any better .
With all the bad wrecks I see everyday . I would think 80% are because of the phone .

Just about everyone is on there phone . It's fucking nuts
At 55 mph you look down to text for 5 seconds You traveled 100 yards . I beleive lots of those truckers, ending up in the ditch , are distracted .
With e logs now , you have to shut down when your over on hours .
No two or three log books anymore .
 

monkeyswrench

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My buddy ran with Swift (So What I Fucking Tried) for all of 4 weeks. He had a company truck that had all kinds of shit. It had auto braking if you got too close. Try that in bumper to bumper traffic. It did have Elog crap that was tied to the company, hard breaking, speeding or sudden steering input was not only recorded to the Elog, but also sent back to the dispatch. That same truck would also start giving time warnings at intervals letting you know when it would be shutting down...sucks balls if you're in city traffic running down the clock. Add that to the math fiasco @spectra3279 was saying, and it's a clusterfuck. I don't know how many companies run that type of system. Some companies before ran governed speeds I thought due to insurance costs.

(My buddy's running a 4 axle with an rgn gooseneck...Hauls big stuff. Military background helps him some, moving tanks and other stuff to different bases :oops:)
 

yard dog

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My buddy ran with Swift (So What I Fucking Tried) for all of 4 weeks. He had a company truck that had all kinds of shit. It had auto braking if you got too close. Try that in bumper to bumper traffic. It did have Elog crap that was tied to the company, hard breaking, speeding or sudden steering input was not only recorded to the Elog, but also sent back to the dispatch. That same truck would also start giving time warnings at intervals letting you know when it would be shutting down...sucks balls if you're in city traffic running down the clock. Add that to the math fiasco @spectra3279 was saying, and it's a clusterfuck. I don't know how many companies run that type of system. Some companies before ran governed speeds I thought due to insurance costs.

(My buddy's running a 4 axle with an rgn gooseneck...Hauls big stuff. Military background helps him some, moving tanks and other stuff to different bases :oops:)
. As of sept 2020 the rule was changed the adverse driving conditions exception which is weather or congestion ,new rule is 2 more hours of drive time so the workday can be extended to much as 16 hours in instead of the previous rule , 14 hours and the extra 2 hours of drive time had to be within the maximum 14 hour workday .
 
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monkeyswrench

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. As of sept 2020 the rule was changed the adverse driving conditions exception which is weather or congestion ,new rule is 2 more hours of drive time so the workday can be extended to much as 16 hours in instead of the previous rule , 14 hours and the extra 2 hours of drive time had to be within the maximum 14 hour workday .
Luckily, I have not messed with a log book (or three) since 2004. In 05, I had my wreck. Non-commercial, but required extensive medical treatment...DMV pulled my ticket. I had to retest just to start driving a car again. At that point I wasn't really worried about driving trucks again, just wanted to get to Dr's appointments without asking my parents for a ride. Pretty embarrassing owning a home and having a family...People thought I had a DUI or something.
 

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Just stop at the truck stops on your way to the river. Go inside for a meal and your question will be answered.
 
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