Posted on 08/07/2011 11:53:31 AM PDT by Daffynition
Let me tell you a little about the truck driver you just flipped off because he was passing another truck, and you had to cancel the cruise control and slow down until he completed the pass and moved back over.
His truck is governed to 68 miles an hour, because the company he leases it from believes it keeps him and the public and the equipment safer.
The truck he passed was probably running under 65 mph to conserve fuel. You see, the best these trucks do for fuel economy is about 8 miles per gallon. With fuel at almost $4 per gallon -- well, you do the math. And, yes, that driver pays for his own fuel.
He needs to be 1,014 miles from where he loaded in two days. And he can't fudge his federally mandated driver log, because he no longer does it on paper; he is logged electronically.
He can drive 11 hours in a 14-hour period; then he must take a 10-hour break. And considering that the shipper where he loaded held him up for five hours because it is understaffed, he now needs to run without stopping for lunch and dinner breaks.
(Excerpt) Read more at startribune.com ...
Bless you and your dad!
I’ve noticed that folks’ driving becoming more ‘n more rude and aggressive; even in the grocery line; I think it’s a sign of the times and yes, I *do* blame Obama. ;)
“Lifeblood of the economy?” Really?
Sure, trucking is an important job. But it isn’t more important than other jobs. How is the guy who delivered your TV more integral to the process than the guy who designed it or the guy who soldered it together or the guy who built the store that sold it to you?
Also, why should truck drivers be sanctified because they work long hours? I do, too. What about the people who pick the lettuce truckers deliver? Should they be canonized? And the farmers — let’s build them a cathedral, too. And the guy that makes the tires that go on the farmer’s tractor. See where I’m going? Nobody’s job is more important than anyone else’s — unless you are a United States soldier.
Nothing falls on deaf ears like people complaining about their freely chosen jobs in a free-market economy. It isn’t the false choice of be a truck driver or go on welfare; it’s be a truck driver or go do something else for a living. Or start your own trucking company and do it better. Are you chained up? Then get on a plane and go to your sister’s funeral.
And when you ride my bumper at 65 mph in your multi-ton instant death machine because I won’t get out of your lane or whatever it is you think I should do, you’re threatening my life. Don’t cry when you get the one-finger salute.
I agree with the poster who commented on the “victim” shawl everyone is so anxious to wrap themselves in.
Let the flaming begin...
They have a tough time, and in the last few years, it's not unusual to see older married couples doing that job.
If you don't like the odds, stay out of the bulls eye. If you have the option to get out of the way, but chose not to, who had the ultimate decision?
I have never heard of a big rig getting 8 mpg. Most would be extremely happy at 6 but are getting 4.
When I was growing up, I had fantasized about becoming a truck driver - "Smokey & The Bandit" and all that stuff. I figured at the time it was one of the last jobs in America where you could be your own man and set your own schedule without a lot of harassment from the bosses. Yes, I'd spend my working life listening to the radio and discovering every nook and cranny of America as the miles rolled under my feet. I'd even get to play around with the CB radio!
However, the reality of truck driving is much different. Your life is actually micro-managed by a distant fleet control center that has you on GPS and knows instantly when you pull into a rest center or even change your speed. Also, like many other working class jobs, wages have gone down or at best, remained stagnant over the years and if you screw up once, you can lose your job and get replaced somebody who is willing to take your job for even less money.
Speaking of trucks and of "Smokey And The Bandit" - what would happen in real life if you drove your sports car up the ramp of a moving tractor trailer? Anybody who has seen "Smokey And The Bandit" where Burt Reynolds, evading the cops, drives his red Corvette up the ramp of a moving truck at about 90 miles an hour and then pulls up the ramp and closed the back door.
Maybe some Freepers good with physics can explain what would really happen in a scenario like that. My guess is that as soon as Burt Reynolds hit that ramp, his speed would double from 90 to 180 mph and he and the sports car would crash through the front of the truck at 90mph as he'd have no time to hit the brakes and slow down to the speed of the moving truck.
Here’s the short answer. If every truck in the country disappears tomorrow, your remaining lifespan got a lot shorter. An EMP pulse couldn’t do a better job of shutting down our civilization.
His incremental speed would be his ground speed minus the speed of the trailer.
So he’d have to brake from that incremental speed to 0 in 53 feet to avoid ramming the front wall of the trailer.
I can’t imagine...
Donner Pass on I80? I didn’t know California allowed triples.
Mythbusters did the truck ramp test. I believe it worked.
So if he was moving at 72 mph and the trailer was at 70 mph, that would be an incremental speed of just 2 mph? In that case, it should be very doable to go up the ramp of a moving trailer and have time to stop before it rams into the front wall?
Of course, that does not take into consideration how practical it would be to lower a ramp on a moving trailer as the friction would throw up a lot of sparks when it hit the pavement below - unless the ramp was on wheels.
That’s a silly fantasy argument. If all our oil supplies were suddenly cut off, we’d shut down just as quickly. Or if the Chinese staged a nuclear attack. Or if the sun went supernova. Or if a giant asteroid hit Montana. What if a famine wiped out this year’s harvest of everything?
You could play this game for hours. Sure, trucks are important. But they’re not more important than what I do for a living. Or what you do.
Think for a moment of all the millions and millions of our own who are out of work right now, and would like a job during this depression.
Which brings home, how important it is for us to make sure we get a new POTUS in '12.
My speedometer is broken. I get passed by trucks and I'm doing 75.
It's kind of hard to take anything seriously after that. Anyone who has traveled on I-81 knows you have to go 50 on the uphills and 90 on the downhills or you will get run over.
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