CHAPTER 12
("She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain")
I was doing pretty well my first few months driving solo for Celadon. I hadn't fully mastered floating gears but I seemed to shift okay. I ended up having to go through two trainers before I had my mandatory 12,000 miles of training completed. My first trainer was a fat guy named Meatballs. He was really a hoot. So many jokes used to race through my mind when it was his turn to sit in that big boy seat and billy big rig. It kind of reminded me of Crusty the Clown squeezing into a kids tricycle by just watching him. He left so much ass smell ingrained into that drivers seat I was afraid to sit in it in fear of that smell getting into my clothes. He showered often which was great but he never seemed to smell any better when he got out. But my biggest chuckle from watching Meatballs?
Was watching him turn our 30 minute break into a 45 almost EVERY time because the extra 15 minutes came from him walking the 50 yards back to the rig. I still had to show respect towards Meatballs because he'd been a trucker for 7 years. He was already in that million miler club. Meatballs was too big to deal with seat belt asphyxiation and not in the least bit ashamed of the 7 seat belt violations he had accrued over his Trucking Career. But Milan Trucking WAS ashamed and told him no while he moonlighted on the side. Evidently Celadon was doing away with salary pay and Meatballs was smart enough to know the cents per mile scam left bills unpaid and was itching to quit Celadon. Before Meatballs could quit he was terminated for driving the truck under my logs. That is a very illegal serious offense that violates DOT regulations but how Celadon found out about it is beyond me because I'm quite certain I never told anyone. I was convinced after hearing of Meatballs termination that Celadon must secretly have cameras installed in their trucks. Meatballs was too much entertainment for me to assist the company of letting him go. I was only stuck back in there dorm for another three days before a beautiful fox named Mindy Edwards found me another trainer. I was convinced in my delirious mind that Mindy was over qualified to work in the offices of Celadon and was in fact a high powered attorney that was just temporarily working there undercover. She had the whole professional looking pantsuits and all. I was even convinced that she was more observant than the other female staff in there because I often caught her noticing that no matter what hat I was wearing it was always a super tight squeeze trying to wrap it around my big massive brain. Maybe it was wishful thinking I dunno, but it seemed every time I came around Mindy her eyes were fixated on just what exactly was going on inside of my head because she was always looking way above my eye level. She prolly noticed that each and every one of my hats was always set on the largest setting for it to be ensconced around my head. I couldn't confess my secret crush towards Mindy in fear of sexual harassment charges as I was sure most likely she was happily married. But what I really liked about her? She could see through the bullshit.
Months ago when I entered Mindy's cubicle to meet my 2nd trainer Mindy was on the phone with somebody I didn't know. I'll never forget how funny it was when she looked up at me and smiled while she was still on the phone.
"Oh I see he's been skirting the system rather well."
It was all I could do to keep a straight face. That Florida UC attorney had managed to keep that imaginary beach ball from touching the sand just yet. I wouldn't have to be fighting for the hot dog prongs like the other drivers stuck doing the high sodium 2 for $3 special at the Loves because boo was threatening to give more income secrets to the parole officer.
And I DEFINITELY didn't have to worry about rolling the dice and seeing how many miles I could get in with a car Tom Tom GPS before a bridge would jump out on front of me. But things wouldn't go ENTIRELY hunky dory for me. Celadon wanted to train me right. They had a USMC Marine deck of cards up their sleeve that would put me under a new set of rules a lot more stringent than just showing respect towards elders. My new trainer tucked himself in at night with the military style helicopter sheets. He even boasted about being proud of his company nickname. The Terminator. AKA. Mel S.
Mel had a long military career as well as 20 years in the trucking industry. It was nice learning valuable skills to make me a better safer driver but I had a bigger problem now. I had to put up with Mel. Mel from Hell. Shirt tucking, suck-it-up soldier Mel. I can't think of just how many potty brakes I had skipped just to put on a big show. Fortunately for me, Mindy had put me on a gravy dedicated account to be trained on that involved little traffic and no mountains. Our dedicated account was around 2200 miles weekly and ran from Lodi, Ohio to Arlington, TX running car doors for General Motors plant. In fact the entire training period I never hauled a load more than 12,000lbs.
When there was a few weeks left in my training I finally started getting curious where I would be routed running solo once my 12,000 miles training was finished.
"I don't know!" Says Mel, "But it definitely won't be running this route."
I remembered in High school geography staring at the abrasive maps. The protruding ones that made the USA look like a pair of boobs. All of this training I was doing only involved me running up and down our country's naval. I needed to know what those mountains would be like!
The engine brake button was mixed in with at least seven other buttons. There was three different settings that I really knew nothing about. I can clearly remember what happened at one point and time in my training.
I reached my arm out to fiddle with the engine brake button out of curiosity. I noticed the words "Eng" and "Brake" there was also the numbers 1,2,and 3.
"So what do these numbers do?" I asked one day.
As soon as my paws got close to pushing on the engine brake button Mel literally swatted my hand away.
"We will not be using them." Was in fact his verbatim words. AUGUST 2014 (Swimmers learn best by getting thrown in)
I couldn't understand why Celadon seemed to be routing me along the east coast so much. I was quite certain in my paperwork I signed off on wanting to stay Midwest. Less traffic. No slowing mountains. And of course in Texas, lots and lots of yummy homemade burritos.
It was a nice and beautiful day as I was hauling over 40,000 pounds of recycled paper to a landfill along the east coast. I was driving solo now and still never had the slightest idea that each and every load I hauled at no given point had my engine brakes ever been utilized. If I saw a hill I hit the jake brake button and usually went down a gear or two. Every now and then I would notice a little bit of smoke back there but never thought anything of it as it always cleared up and went away. But what I DID'NT know, was in order to have the jake brakes actually turned "on" required an additional step of pushing an entirely different button located on the steering wheel. Yes I was in fact just that stupid. The jake brake button I knew about on the dash was only meant for adjusting the strength of the brake with "1" being a soft brake and "3" being the strongest. Mel had never taught me about the additional button on the steering wheel needed to turn them on. Mel was usually too busy telling racist jokes or just flat out taking a brake from flipping off Mexican truckers passing by to harass me instead with stupid quips he thought were funny like. "Oh you just need to put on a different skirt". When I asked him the best way for me to get payroll's attention to deflect them from vandalizing my weekly paychecks. I was smart though. I only needed him to pass my training and knew of all the tricks to keep him in a good mood. Every time things got edgy in there I always said. "Hey Mel can you tell me some more war stories. It was funny because Mel was an embellisher like no other. There were many stories about him holding home invaders at gunpoint. If you had a Corvette, Mel had one too. If you had a good gambling story, Mel had a better one. I knew his type.
It was just before lunch time and I was making my way through the mountains in "Hangry" mode. Probably not a good idea because "Hangry" mode always left me feeling compelled to divert all the attention I needed on the road and put 100% of that needed attention span right on my belly. The wheels could roll off and if I was in "Hangry" mode I might just (no I would just ha ha) keep rolling if I saw those Golden Arches looming in the distance and luring in my trucker belly. Unfortunately, I was stuck on I-64 East and on my way to Richmond Virginia with nowhere to stop for lunch. The only place to stop my rig was just 3 miles short of mile marker 136. The very top of a very big mountain!
I was getting confused. There was a sign at the top of the mountain forcing all trucks to pull over and stop. I looked at two other trucks pulled over and couldn't figure out why these truckers looked scared and opted to take their 30 minute lunch break next to a tree probably full of deer ticks. Not even so much as a vending machine. There was even a big yellow sign that said "Truckers Reduce Gear".
The sign even said 7% grade next 4 miles but I had no clue what that meant?
I did exactly as the sign said. The sign didn't say how many gears to go down so I figured going down just one gear ought to do it as I was in a hurry to find a place for my lunch break.
Only fools kept refrigerators in their truck as green eyed mechanics were known for purposely breaking them and allowing water to flood all over the floor. Not to mention the cigarette plugs blew fuses all the time leaving you a good chance to get sick from spoiled food.
At the time I wasn't paying attention to know that not only was the mountain very winding and steep, there wasn't one single lull to give your brakes a chance to catch up. It was literally FOUR STRAIGHT MILES at a very steep 7%.
I did okay my first mile down the mountain and it felt like another day to me. But as I hit mile number 2 I couldn't figure out why I couldn't feel any help from the jake brakes. I tried pushing it to setting 3 and still didn't notice any difference. I literally had no clue that my engine brakes were NEVER ON IN THE FIRST PLACE. I buckled down to 8th gear but was frightened by the RPM gage needle shooting way up and was worried all those extra RPMs would destroy the engine so I up shifted back into 9th gear so my RPM gage would return to normal. THAT WAS MY BIGGEST MISTAKE.
Before I knew it my frequent brake stabbing was causing quite a lot of smoke back there. With all the weight I was hauling it felt just like a massive ocean wave pushing me hard whether I wanted to be pushed or not. I continued brake stabbing to prevent brake lockup but I was being pushed so hard brake stabbing wasn't helping and I was picking up unwanted speed. Smoke was shooting out from the back everywhere and I knew a complete conflagration was very imminent! I tried to relax assuming any minute I'd be down the mountain and back to normal speed but then noticed a sign stating I still had two miles to go! I still refused to believe how much danger I was in and the nursery rhyme song started to plague my mind to evoke humor out of a very dire situation. I hadn't had this much fun since my 30th birthday where my sister paid for us to ride a very small commuter plane. The plane was getting full and the copilot seat was unoccupied. Before the pilot could assign anybody the seat my sister made the comment "Can the birthday boy sit in the cockpit?" It was an open cockpit to the rest of the plane and the moment we took off my sister joking says "ha ha, Blake just look at him. He's thinking about wrecking this plane right to the ground. Everybody laughed except me. It wasn't that I didn't find her comment humorous. The placid look on my face was because I was freaked out by my sister reading my mind. Just like the blond at Celadon that knew I wasn't listening to our orientation director Paul!
But the two more miles down grade sign was a real killjoy for me. I was excited but cloying fear superseded that excitement in every way. I continued to stab brake hoping the brakes would cool down in between stabs. That's when the billowy smoke from behind reminded me that I had a full load and literally no brakes left at all. Mel should've showed me how to use those jake brakes. My rig was going to catch fire any second now. I had no other choice but to try downshifting which was about the dumbest thing I could have possibly done. I tried going down to 8th and had a real "Oh shit" moment!
I remember looking to my left and seeing another trucker with a very concerned look on his face. Evidently he must have been empty if he was able to keep up with me. I put my eyes back on the road but he continued to ride abreast of me. My heart was pounding wildly as I looked back once more to check for flames. The mountain was more convoluted than a slinky and my speed was getting so high if I didn't bust a move in the next five seconds I was certain with the sharp curve coming up I was going to roll over the sharp left curve and flip my way down a curve as my brakes refused to slow me down.
My guardian angel trucker dude riding abreast of me pointed towards the escape ramp looming in the distance right before the curb. I careened the 18 wheeler towards the escape ramp and embraced myself for a very, very wild ride. I made sure to grip the steering wheel VERY tight!
I got a little rise when I pounced my way into the sandpit along side the mountain. Fortunately for me I was running into a lot of luck. And I mean A LOT OF LUCK. The escape ramp consisted of sand and pointed slightly down rather than the ones shooting up. It also didn't have all those big foreboding humpty humps that could damage the rig. I didn't so much as fishtail.
As the truck came to a complete stop I couldn't stop staring at that sharp curve 100 yards ahead of me. I was sure if I hit that curve with the weight I had I'd be dangling off the guard rail if I was lucky. My hands were wrapped so tightly to the steering wheel that not even pliers could peel them off. After reality set in I finally was able to get out of the rig and check on it. Both the tractor and trailer were 100% completely unscathed. The only thing that wasn't were my nerves. It took me every bit of five minutes to catch my breath.
Some guy in a red pickup truck pulled over and started playing with the gear shifter. It was really pissing me off having a complete stranger lean right through my driver's window and fooling with the gear shifter. As I write this story four years later I know in fact what he was doing. This stranger was not in fact there to be my friend. He was checking to see if the truck was in gear. I had lost my gear going down the mountain. But because my new guy card hadn't quite yet expired, I was certain I was going to get away with it!
When the nosy old man in the red truck finally drove away I figured I was in the clear. I put the truck in reverse to back out of the escape ramp and continue with delivering my 44,000 pound load of recycled paper. I would have gotten away with it if I would have been smart enough to steer the rig just one more foot to the right and kept my right tires on the pavement. I was SOL and I knew it. Sand was shooting out between my tires and I was going nowhere! I tried three more times but only found myself digging deeper and deeper into the sand! I had no choice but to report the incident to my employer. I figured I'd be okay since my rig didn't so much as have a scratch on it.
I called into the company but opted to give just my driver code instead of my name. Hopefully they would just forget and have a tow truck give me a nice little tug out of the sandbox.
I could tell whomever answered at Celadon was a guy still in his twenties. I knew my voice sounded shaky so I had no plans of talking too much or revealing any trepidation in my voice.
"Hello Celadon."
I immediately gave him my tractor number but not my name. We were never required to give our name as tractor numbers were considered sufficient ID. The Celadon dude continued the phone call today.
"What can I help you with today?"
"I uh....I uh. I'm stuck in some sand and gonna need a wrecker to pull me out."
The dispatcher sounded confused but not concerned yet at this point.
"What are you doing in the sand?"
I didn't know how to reply. There was a long pause before I spoke. "I had to use an escape ramp on I-64 mile marker 136. I was heading east to Richmond Virginia and my brakes almost caught on fire so I used the escape ramp alongside of the mountain."
"You lost your brakes going down the mountain? Are you alright?"
Obviously the dispatcher sounded concerned. But I reiterate "dispatcher" because I could plainly hear the rest of the twenties giggly crowd in there highly amused by the daily entertainment I provided them with. I DIDN'T think all of this was funny. Clearly I was improperly trained and if luck wasn't on my side that day I could've easily died. A few months later I would eventually read an online story of this very thing happening to a new student driver and how it all played out. He didn't think it was funny either and cursed them all out. His online post told it that way and he stated in his post that after his escape ramp incident he bagged it up right then and there and refused to ever drive truck again.
I was not deterred by this online post of a driver calling it quits after an escape ramp incident. I was Blaker209 and vowed to keep my trucker name bestowed upon me by my very first lumper from driving box truck that actually believed I purposely drove a commercial truck on 209 through Bushkill PA to interrupt a Nudist Colony which involved a $10,000.00 fine. The rumor was quite funny but not entirely true. I never got caught nor did I ever get a $10,000.00 fine.
Would Blaker209 say goodbye to a trucking career just from a little struggle getting down a mountain? OF COURSE NOT. It was no secret to the trucking industry. I was the REAL BillyBig Rigger!