Hello everyone. Praise the Lord!
It was last Friday that I was at VLS Recovery, in Hockley, Texas, to pick up my second load for the day. I almost always have two loads on Fridays. Now I was in a hurry to get the day done because I was going to Louisiana that evening, but I was not in a hurry generally.
I hooked up to the trailer just like I always do, and heard The fifth wheel rattle. I hooked up my airlines and dollied up the landing gear. After giving my equipment a good inspection, apparently not good enough, I gave it a good tug as I was pulling out.
I did my usual tug when I latched to the trailer and then after I was hooked up I did another tug, This time using the trailer brakes. That's my usual routine and it's worked for thirty-two years now. But now looking back, the fifth wheel rattled, but didn't make a latching sound.
As I pulled up the plant road, I was making my turn so I could back up and turn around. As I was slowly making that turn I felt a large thud! That was the loaded trailer dropping on the frame of the tractor!
I couldn't believe it I tugged on it twice how could it come loose! So I got out and saw that the trailer didn't hit the ground, and was still on the tractor's frame and on the driver side rear tires! It came very close to sliding off but it was still hanging on!
Being that the trailer did not hit the ground, it wasn't such a big deal. If the trailer had actually hit the ground that would have been a huge deal! Then I would have to take the trailer into the shop to have inspected!
That would mean incident report, drug test, and several unpleasant interviews! When the trailer hit the tractor, most of the plant heard it. A guy came out and asked if I needed help, I said yes!
He went and got a large forklift to try to lift up the trailer. He did lift it up a little bit where I can do a couple turns on the landing gear handle. Dirk came over and said "I've done that a couple times you got to get a crane." So he went and got the backhoe.
With a backhoe and the forklift working together, I was able to get a few more swings on the handle. It turned out that was just enough to get the tractor underneath it. Things looked up from there! I knew at that point that it would all be okay.
I disconnected the tractor, dropped my airbags and slowly moved out. I straightened up the tractor got back underneath with a hard hit! I was able to get underneath the trailer! Then I raised the tractor's airbags to lift up the trailer. Then I dollied up the landing gear and I was ready to go. It only cost me thirty minutes.
Before I could leave the plant, Jesse the safety man called! He asked if I had hit anything! I told him I didn't hit anything, I just dropped the trailer and it slid off onto the back of the tractor. He said it sounded like glass breaking on the video!
I told him that no glass was broken, and I managed to get back underneath the trailer okay. He said okay, he was concerned because that was the second one this week, so someone else had done the same thing recently! I thought about it and told him that this can happen if the fifth wheel grease is dirty, it can keep the latch from locking in.
So I finished the day without incident, a little paranoid the rest of the day about my latch. But I finished the day and Gretchen and I headed towards Louisiana. And there we had a wonderful weekend together!
In the trucking business we always have little incidents such as these. It's important to learn from them and not to be too worried about it. Life is not perfect and trucking business certainly is not either. we just have to learn from these incidents and move on and keep trucking!
William James Roop
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