Re: The end of an era, for me at least

Posted by The tractor vet on October 07, 2017 at 10:21:04 from (104.179.81.68):

In Reply to: The end of an era, for me at least posted by Jon f mn on October 07, 2017 at 05:41:48:

Congrats on the local haul job . it is nice to be home and sleep in your own bed . Now the down side is if you have a same route load after load job if you do not end up going BING BONG in a couple years that's great. I took one of them jobs many years back . Ran between Youngstown and Warren hauling COKE , no not the kind ya drink and not the stuff ya sniff . 7 loads a day 7 days a week with maybe two to four return loads . only time we got off is when the mill at either end had a problem . Then there were the days when the Coke haul ran 24 7 . same roads over and over again , only open road was from Poland Ave to Ohio Rt 46 and we got to use I680 , the rest was urban and city driving , lot of practice in gear selection, stop and go . Got to the point it was pushing me over the edge . told the boss that he either find something else for me to do or i was going to quiet . So he stuck we on keeping a concrete company stocked with stone . Yea really , this was no better as now it was all city driving 98 % of the time . Occasionally i would have to go to Thompson O. to get Pee gravel , nice ride out in the country . BUT on the weekends it was back to the Coke haul . In the winter months not much concrete work so it was the Coke haul. the straw that broke the camels back was the two snow storms in Jan. of 77 First one to hit i was on my third load for the day and it started coming down as i was getting off 680 and making my turn on to Poland Ave. with a load of BFF ( Blast Furnace Fines and the sky just opened up ) It was coming down so hard that if that Binder would have been a 4300 i would not have been able to see the grab handle on the hood . Made it into the mill and made the circle around the guard shack and gave the guard his copy of the bills and went on down to the Blast Furnace and dumped , When i came back up to the guard shack there was a small up grade and i had to cross the one road leading back to the Coke plant and it was a signal lane in and out deal. I stopped on the grade and i could not even see the guard shack a 100 foot away . I knew that there were two trucks ahead of me and they had to be in the back but Tom just may be on hhis way out . So i called on the radio and Tom said he was setting in the road way and could not see to come out and Carl was loading . So i sat there and waited . Snow let up for a little bit and here comes Tom out with a load and i called Carl and asked if he was moving and he said he was only a 1/4 loaded and to come on back in . Between the snow and all the steam you could not see and it took me about fifteen min.s to get back in . I got under the shoot as Carl only made it a couple hundred feet before he could not see with the next round of white out .I got loaded and pulled out and was setting behind Carl and you could not see ten feet . when it let up to where we could see and were just getting ready to pull out the one Foreman came up to my truck and said we are shutting down and tell the rest not to come back it's getting to bad and unsafe for trucks and we are switching to rail. FINE BY ME . Carl pulled out and was gone while i was talking to the foreman . and here comes the next round of white out . I had the biggest trailer on the haul and i could get five to eight thousand pounds more on plus i had a lift axle and i could keep it up and dump more weight on the drives . I could here on the C B that 680 had turned into a junk yard and Carl had made it up onto 680 and got hit by a straight truck . SOOOOo the only way to warren was down over the market st bridge and make a left on Ft. St. and over to 422 up to 169 up to Warren and the mill . 2 hours and 45 min.s later as i was coming down 169 and setting at the traffic light by the bosses house and our parking spot i backed in and called it a day . And here comes the boss yelling and screaming because i came in loaded and not delivered the load. And i told him flat out that after two hours and 45 min to get here loaded that my life or someone elses life was not worth the 200 dollars that that load paid. Then his other truck comes in empty and being empty Bob could not back in off the street and i had to use my four wheel drive pick up to drag him in , when Bob stepped out of the truck he plum lost it on john . I went on home and even with a 3/4 ton four wheel drive with really good big meaty tires the 21 mile drive home took me three hours . We got like 27 inches of snow on that round . I put my plow on and went plowing and i got a call from a friends wife to come down and plow out there lane so her husband could get in with his truck and in the doing so i slide off there lane down into a revane and had to call for help to get up and out of there , while doing this i found the weak point in my truck and blew the spider gears ion the ft. rear end . Then Thursday we had the Blizzard hit and i got trapped five miles from my house . And had to spend the night at a buddys place . Next day Mike and i had the only two trucks that could get around I had the ft. end fixed and was back in operation with four hours of work and 27 dollars in parts. anyway Mike and i worked non stop digging people out of snow drifts , hauling fuel of all kinds , taking food in to stranded people dug our way in to a couples home to get them out and there daughter to the hospital , while Mike was doing that i went ahead of them and started cutting a path up St. Rt 9 one drift was huge over top of the bubble gum on top the cab of a 73 F250 I blasted a hole thru it 7 and a half feet wide when the state truck could not put a dent in it ( he just did not hit it fast enough . Like i said we worked non stop till around five on Monday when i went home and died . Most north south roads were still closed and around 3 in the morning on tuesday my boss callls and say Coke is starting at FIVE i live 21 miles SOUTh and John and i had short hostl works when he told me you have four wheel dirve you be here , ah you are 100 feet from my truck and the key are in the ignition so you set in the dinniing room looking out the windwon and if i am not there at FIVE then YOU drive the blanky blankty thing yourself and hung up . Tried the oil field till Aug and that drove me to buy my own truck .

Replies:

• Re: The end of an era, for me at least Leroy 11:43:24 10/07/17 (0)

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