No. 1
60 miles out from picking up a trailer in Stoughton, WI on Dec 6, I called my dispatcher just to check in and found out this trailer was not fully cleared for delivery. So I pulled into an oasis on I-90 east of Rockford, IL to wait for word from Dale to either go on or take the trailer back. I waited for about 6 hours. The oasis bridges the interstate and has parking and fuel on both east- & westbound sides. Motorists from either side enter the same food court which is built directly above the freeway. I was on the eastbound side. About 1:30 p.m. I heard from Dale that the trailer was okay to deliver. But it was too late in the day to deliver in Cleveland before 5:00, so I was in no rush to get on the road. I resumed watching “Pirates of Penzance” on streaming video. Then at 2:30 there was a big ka-boom that could be felt. I thought my truck had been struck. I put my shoes on and jumped down to see what had happened. Across the freeway, next the oasis westbound parking, a 7 story building had blown apart. My truck was facing the building, so sitting in the driver’s seat I looked through binoculars at the explosion site. I could see flashing red lights of fire trucks arriving on the other side of the building. I didn’t stick around. Next day I googled ‘Belvidere, Il news’ and immediately saw an article from a Rockford paper. A truck driver was killed standing next to his truck right next to the blast. The building housed large containers for making synthetic quartz, owned by a Japanese company. Only one other person was injured.
No. 2
Tues, Dec. 8, I was in Cleveland to deliver and picked up another trailer near Toledo, OH bound for Philadelphia area. That night I was on I-80 in PA as the snow came down. It got worse and worse until I had to get off the road. Visibility got extremely poor, so I decided to take the next exit, which was Exit 111. It was a bad place to get off in the snow. It had not yet been cleared, and it sloped up-hill from the freeway. I got stuck part way up the ramp. There was nothing to do but go to bed. But soon a policeman knocked on the door to say I had to move. I’m stuck… Another truck was stuck behind me. He called a tow truck and was towed up the hill to the entrance ramp – a down-hill slope. I got to speak with the tow truck driver, Ken. He is a good guy and recommended I just wait till morning when the ramp would be cleared and I could get out without being towed. However, the police told him he had to tow me, so I got towed to the entrance ramp - $100. I went to bed. Next morning I was the only truck left on the ramp. The sun was up. The ramp was cleared, but I was on the shoulder, which was still snow-covered. I tried & tried, but could not get rolling, even though I was on a down-hill slope. My drives slid towards the ditch, so my truck ended up in a V-shape between truck & trailer. Finally I had to call the tow truck back. This time Ken’s son came in a different tow truck. He got me out – for another $100. The rest of the trip to Philadelphia was fine.
No. 3
Fri night, Dec. 19, Peggy and I arrived about midnight at a Flying J in North East, MD. ‘North East’ is the name of the town. It is at the top of Chesepeake Bay, on I-95, 5 miles south of the Delaware border, 45 miles north of Baltimore. We had driven 380 miles in lovely weather from a town north of Boston. But just as we arrived in Maryland, the weather turned bad. It was starting to snow and didn’t stop all through the next day. Saturday we were supposed to pick up 3 trailers from an auction lot just 4 miles from the truck stop, but they did not open on Saturday because of the weather. It was one of the worst snow storms in the history of the Washington, D.C. area. We were stuck at the truck stop for 56 hours till Mon. morning. It wasn’t so bad. I fiddled a lot in the restaurant. On Sunday, one of the waitresses brought us a Christmas card and gift – 2 celedon-green, “Chesepeake Bay” coffee mugs – very nice. The card thanked us for the music and said it helped them get through a rough night. They were short-staffed due to the weather. We got to know some of the other truckers – especially John & Karen from Florida. Sunday we tried to go to the Lutheran church – nearest one, but they cancelled due to weather. The snow had stopped by Sunday morning, but there was a huge accumulation – piles everywhere. We had the dogs in the truck and had to check on them frequently. Peggy went out about 7:00 p.m. Sunday night to walk the dogs and heard a scuffle going on in the fuel island. We had no trailer, so we were parked with RV’s & cars next to the car pumps. Peggy saw two guys fighting next to a white service pick-up truck with a salt-spreader on the back. A Bad Guy was trying to steal the truck from the Young Man. YM yelled, “Call 911, this is a company truck.” BG fought his way into position and got into the truck. YM still fought through the driver side window. BG pulled out and turned left towards Peggy, almost ran over our dog and plowed into the snow bank next to Peggy. YM fell to the ground and was run over by his own truck. BG got free and drove off. Peggy waited with YM till the ambulance came. She found out YM had seen someone (BG) beside the road and stopped to help. Then BG forced his way into the truck and tried to force YM out. A young couple who had been walking by saw the dogs running loose and put them into our truck. The police asked Peggy for a written statement. Peggy came in to tell me she was going to the police station, so I got up immediately and went along. There were 4 people giving statements – Peggy, the young couple who helped with our dogs, and another driver in the fuel island. Peggy dictated her statement as I wrote it down. North East is a town of 3,000 where nothing happens. The officer who drove us said it’s like Mayberry. He was like Barney Fife. En route back to the truck stop, Barney showed us around town and told us a little of the history of North East, MD. Peggy had asked the chief, Officer Wood, to let us know how the young man was doing in the hospital. Next day we heard he had a broken hip and a broken back. And the BG was caught. We got to our pick-up about 8:00 a.m. Monday – a large auction company that deals in heavy equipment and large commercial vehicles. Though they had spent the weekend plowing their roads, there was still a lot of snow where all the equipment was parked. We got stuck once and had to have the end loader pull our trailer to us. We had to shovel off our 3 trailers. We got hooked up to the bottom one, a low-boy. The end-loader stacked the other two smaller flat-beds on top of that. Then we had to secure the 3 trailers with chains. These are old trailers with some rotten & missing boards on the deck, tail light problems, bad tires… Because of the snow it took 5 hours to get loaded, and once we got on the road we kept stopping to tighten chains, air up tires and check lights. We found a shop near Pittsburgh to fix the tail lights just after they quit working. Finally we made it to Red Bud, IL to drop these trailers the Tuesday before Christmas about 4:00 p.m. The buyer met us at his property, guided us in and helped us unhook. Before we left, I fiddled for him. He wrote a check for the tail light repair and gave us a $100 tip – first tip we’ve ever gotten for this job.
