Posted on 06/06/2007 6:41:56 PM PDT by TornadoAlley3
Troopers Pull Over Man Who Speaks Only Russian
GREENWOOD, Neb. -- The Nebraska State Patrol stopped a truck driver who only speaks Russian, and told him he can go no further until he learns the language, Omaha TV station KETV reported.
"Sir, I need your papers. I need your papers. All of your papers. Log book, registration, yes," a trooper said during a truck safety stop operation near Greenwood.
The trucker had all his documents in order and a valid commercial driver's license, but he couldn't communicate with state troopers. Under the law, troopers were forced to make the driver park his truck and take him out of service.
They talked to his boss on the phone.
"You need to tell your driver he is out of service until he can understand English," Trooper Jeremy Radford told the boss over the telephone.
The driver was still obviously confused and tried to drive away.
Troopers said they are having more and more problems with language barriers.
Federal regulations said that commercial drivers should be able to read and speak the English language sufficiently to converse with the general public. But 17 states and the District of Columbia offer the commercial driver's license test in foreign languages.
Nance Harris of the Nebraska Trucking Association said there's a reason some trucking companies are hiring professional drivers from out of the country.
"Current estimates are that we have a shortage of about 30,000 drivers," Harris said. "It isn't a question of them not understanding the trucking industry or safe driving. They simply need some time to be more conversant in English."
Troopers said the citation has entirely to do with safety because commercial drivers need to be able to read all signs and traffic warnings, especially driving a rig that weighs about 80,000 pounds.
The trucker was stranded at the weigh station until he could find a ride, or for someone from his company to come pick him up along with his truck. Troopers said they will help him do that, but said some drivers have waited at the weigh station for as long as three days for someone to come get them.
around here, the mid-west, truckers earn about 600 - 700 a week! and if they own their own truck they make about 1,100 or so. My sister’s brother-in-law owes a trucking company and that’s what he pays. I’d say for around here, that’s good wages!
You've never taught ESL, have you? I have and reading and writing English v. speaking english are totally different skills.
If you want to drive on roads here in North America with big things like commercial trucks it is in your best interest to be able to speak English and be able to communicate effectively the language of this great country.
I don't disagree with that point. People should be able to read, write and speak English before being allowed to drive large trucks all over the place. I'm just saying that speaking English v. reading and writing English and totally different skills and just because one can pass a written driving test doesn't mean that they should automatically be able to speak English as well.
This’ll get overturned tomorrow.
Way too much common sense...
Mandarin Chinese falls in that category too. Speaking is easy. Reading/writing the pictographs is a major undertaking. Arabic is fairly easy to read, but requires a different inflection when addressing male/female persons.
English is so easy..."We eat what we can and what we can't we can."
November 1994, a fiery crash killed six children from Chicago’s southwest side. The accident was caused by a truck driver who illegally obtained his Illinois commercial drivers license.
Ricardo Guzman cannot speak English and does not have the proper training to drive or maintain his truck. During a delivery to Milwaukee, a chunk of metal fell off his trailer, hit and punctured the gas tank in a family van owned by the Rev. Scott Willis and his wife.
And the money goes to politician campaign funds....
How’s that for IL politics?
The last time I was in the Poway, CA DMV office, I directly observed DMV employees pointing to the correct answers on a written driver's license exam. Both parties (DMV employee and test taker) were speaking in Spanish. This was in 2000. More fraud. More Motor Voter registrations. Likely illegal alien getting a drivers license and a license to vote in our elections. Certainly not a naturalized citizen with demonstrated proficiency in English.
Damn, that looks like a refugee from a Mad Max movie.
I did, but I speak German and understand the road signs. Ditto for driving in Wales. I speak Welsh as well. I read and understand enough Turkish to handle driving in Izmir, but the drivers are just too crazy there. I also avoided driving in Rome. I could read and speak enough Italian to get a cab when I needed it. That came in handy one evening as the train operators called a strike. It was necessary as I had taken my wife to dinner at an Indian restaurant and it was 15 miles back to the hotel.
Last time I looked, all road signs were in ENGLISH. NOT any other language. Makes me ill to think about what happens on our roads with these loonies.
Signs in the U.S. are definitely in English. Drivers here should be able to read them. When you drive in a place like Belgium, you need to be prepared in French, German and Dutch. Traveling from Brussels to Mons you have to be prepared to see Mons called "Bergen" in the German area. The signs approaching a hairpin curve in Wales say, "Arafwch Nawr!". Translated that is "Slow now!". If you don't comprehend it, you may well run off the road and down a steep ravine.
“as a student in undergrad.”
Gee, I’ve heard of Leningrad and Stalingrad, but not Undergrad.
Heh, heh! Just kidding. Actually, I was deployed to Uzbekistan 2003-04, so I was in the former USSR. But the Russian imprint of 150 years occupation was everywhere. For one thing it was far easier to learn some Russian to communicate with Uzbeks than to attempt their Turkic-based language.
Actually, it wasn’t bad where we were. Too bad our State Department managed to get the U.S. kicked out of UZ in 2005. Google “Andizhan” for more info.
That, by its own definition, would make us gay....
Oooops.
Depends on what you mean by "speaking." If you mean reading out loud something written in the language, then I agree with you. When I lived in Korea, once I got a grasp on the pronunciation of the characters I could read it out loud pretty well but if you mean conversation then it is NOT easy until you have a sufficient vocabulary and practice to do so.
Gaaaaa!
Shouldn't someone from the DoJ be having a little talk with certain states' Attorneys General?
Free Clue:
I just saw that movie a couple of weekends ago - it was better than I remembered it being. At the time I thought that plane was extremely unlikely looking, but now I can see that the set/model designer knew a little something about stealth technology. The special effects/flight scenes were pretty cheezy by today’s standard, though, or even compared to something like “Top Gun”.
I made about 10 calls to Dems that I thought would change their stance. By the time you read this the bill might be dead anyway, and this amendment would be back to square one. The English as the National Language Amendment was authored by Senator Inhofe. Please call his office to thank him for the proposal, and encourage him not to give up the fight.
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