Loose Nut
Well-known member
Since I'm in a good mood with the arrival of a job offer, I'd like to start a thread about road safety. I didn't see any similar threads here, though I didn't look too hard, so you mods feel free to move this post if necessary. Now, y'all know I drove a big truck for a number of years, including hauling hazardous materials for more than one outfit, and I've had some additional safety training beyond what many truck drivers normally receive. So I'd like to throw down some safety tips... not all at once, this can be an ongoing thread as far as advice goes, I'll begin by posting a few tips which will dramatically increase your safety on the road, if you happen to just be starting your driving career, or RV driving career.
First, and this is a big one, always "RIDE THE GAP" whenever possible, staying in the open between packs of vehicles, even if that means speeding up or slowing down to prolong your time in that gap. Open space around your vehicle adds greatly to your safety, and also gives you more reaction time. Conversely, "camping out" near or alongside trucks and other vehicles adds to the danger, as a sudden gust, tire blowout, inattentive driver, whatever can put you on the spot in a hazardous situation. Like one old hand here in Arizona told me about real property: "ACREAGE IS YOUR BEST NEIGHBOR!" And he's right, lol... same principle applies on the road. You can't always ride the gap, but you can train yourself to MAXIMIZE the time spent there, 10-4? I do it to this day in my Toyota Camry, lol.
Another thing, this time involving courtesy: learn to dim your bright lights BEFORE blinding oncoming drivers, particularly on skinny little 2-lane blacktop roads. When you wait until that other driver is blinded, you INCREASE the odds of getting into a head-on collision with that driver. So be courteous and dim your brights before you blind other drivers, you'll be adding to your own safety as well. Granted, road courtesy is rapidly going the way of the dinosaur, but YOU can still exercise it, aye? Oh, yeah, and don't hit your high beams to "flash in" a driver who just passed you, learn to momentarily cut your headlights: same message, no irritating distraction or dangerous blinding of drivers in their mirrors. Easy adjustment to make, if you're used to hitting your high beams... makes a world of difference to the other driver.
Signals... here's another way to increase your road safety. Start signaling well in advance of any lane change, merge or other maneuver. I don't mean keep the signal on for half an hour, I mean give other drivers a few seconds for the flashing signals to register. I've seen crazy fools literally cross four or more lanes, scraping across the front bumpers of other drivers, just to make an exit which they didn't realize was rapidly coming up. I once saw such a driver leave it too late, and his pimpwagon sailed over an embankment as it dropped over the side of the exit... crackerhead probably thought he was in the Baja 1000, lol.
Patience.. this is another big one, lol. For me, the best thing truck driving ever taught me was patience, and I wasn't always the most patient man on earth in my younger days, lol. It's almost like a Zen thing, learning patience on the road. Some circumstances are beyond the control of you and other drivers, and one needs to learn how to accept them... or jump off and take a break, ya know? Granted, there are bad drivers out there who could p!ss off the Pope... how you react to them makes a big difference. Moi, I like to slow down or mash on it to get away from bad drivers, same goes for those who want to "camp out" alongside my rig. Some of them are just clueless, which is too bad... makes me long for the good ol' days of 'Driver's Ed' in high school.
Lemme tell y'all a funny story... this truck driver started up one of those walled-in on-ramps in L.A., the kind which start as two lanes and then quickly merge into one before merging with the elevated freeway. Well, grabbing gears from a dead stop, the loaded truck was a little slow in getting up to speed... nothing the truck driver could do about it, it's all physics. Well, some impatient jack@$$ in a pickup truck figured he'd race around the truck and beat him to the big road... the on-ramp canyon got narrow and that fool had to evade the truck. Wound up GRINDING the entire right side of his pickup against the concrete wall, but by God, he BEAT the truck!!! LOL. I always thought that was kinda funny... try exercising a little patience and you won't find yourselves in a similar situation.
Okay, that's it for now, I'm sure others will want to chime in on such a topic, and if they have in some other thread, you mods feel free to move my post. I have more tips for those just starting out, but I'll throw those down later. Well, maybe one or two more right now, I'm long-winded once I get started, lol. Don't hang out near big trucks: tire blowouts can damage your vehicle or cause wrecks. Don't "draft" or tailgate big trucks either: I once saw the broken leaf spring of a truck embedded in the shotgun seat of a D.O.T. bear's vehicle, the photos were posted in the Yuma chickenhouse... anybody sitting shotgun would've been IMPALED by the flying leaf spring section which came right through the windshield. I told that D.O.T. bear, "DAMN, YOU WERE LUCKY, DUDE!!!" And he was too... he nodded his serious assent.
ALRIGHT, HOPE THIS HELPS SOME OF YOU DRIVERS JUST STARTING OUT... EXPERIENCED 'HIGHWAY HEROES' ALREADY KNOW WHAT TO DO, BUT LEARN SOMETHING NEW EVERY DAY, LOL. CHEERS!!!
First, and this is a big one, always "RIDE THE GAP" whenever possible, staying in the open between packs of vehicles, even if that means speeding up or slowing down to prolong your time in that gap. Open space around your vehicle adds greatly to your safety, and also gives you more reaction time. Conversely, "camping out" near or alongside trucks and other vehicles adds to the danger, as a sudden gust, tire blowout, inattentive driver, whatever can put you on the spot in a hazardous situation. Like one old hand here in Arizona told me about real property: "ACREAGE IS YOUR BEST NEIGHBOR!" And he's right, lol... same principle applies on the road. You can't always ride the gap, but you can train yourself to MAXIMIZE the time spent there, 10-4? I do it to this day in my Toyota Camry, lol.
Another thing, this time involving courtesy: learn to dim your bright lights BEFORE blinding oncoming drivers, particularly on skinny little 2-lane blacktop roads. When you wait until that other driver is blinded, you INCREASE the odds of getting into a head-on collision with that driver. So be courteous and dim your brights before you blind other drivers, you'll be adding to your own safety as well. Granted, road courtesy is rapidly going the way of the dinosaur, but YOU can still exercise it, aye? Oh, yeah, and don't hit your high beams to "flash in" a driver who just passed you, learn to momentarily cut your headlights: same message, no irritating distraction or dangerous blinding of drivers in their mirrors. Easy adjustment to make, if you're used to hitting your high beams... makes a world of difference to the other driver.
Signals... here's another way to increase your road safety. Start signaling well in advance of any lane change, merge or other maneuver. I don't mean keep the signal on for half an hour, I mean give other drivers a few seconds for the flashing signals to register. I've seen crazy fools literally cross four or more lanes, scraping across the front bumpers of other drivers, just to make an exit which they didn't realize was rapidly coming up. I once saw such a driver leave it too late, and his pimpwagon sailed over an embankment as it dropped over the side of the exit... crackerhead probably thought he was in the Baja 1000, lol.
Patience.. this is another big one, lol. For me, the best thing truck driving ever taught me was patience, and I wasn't always the most patient man on earth in my younger days, lol. It's almost like a Zen thing, learning patience on the road. Some circumstances are beyond the control of you and other drivers, and one needs to learn how to accept them... or jump off and take a break, ya know? Granted, there are bad drivers out there who could p!ss off the Pope... how you react to them makes a big difference. Moi, I like to slow down or mash on it to get away from bad drivers, same goes for those who want to "camp out" alongside my rig. Some of them are just clueless, which is too bad... makes me long for the good ol' days of 'Driver's Ed' in high school.
Lemme tell y'all a funny story... this truck driver started up one of those walled-in on-ramps in L.A., the kind which start as two lanes and then quickly merge into one before merging with the elevated freeway. Well, grabbing gears from a dead stop, the loaded truck was a little slow in getting up to speed... nothing the truck driver could do about it, it's all physics. Well, some impatient jack@$$ in a pickup truck figured he'd race around the truck and beat him to the big road... the on-ramp canyon got narrow and that fool had to evade the truck. Wound up GRINDING the entire right side of his pickup against the concrete wall, but by God, he BEAT the truck!!! LOL. I always thought that was kinda funny... try exercising a little patience and you won't find yourselves in a similar situation.
Okay, that's it for now, I'm sure others will want to chime in on such a topic, and if they have in some other thread, you mods feel free to move my post. I have more tips for those just starting out, but I'll throw those down later. Well, maybe one or two more right now, I'm long-winded once I get started, lol. Don't hang out near big trucks: tire blowouts can damage your vehicle or cause wrecks. Don't "draft" or tailgate big trucks either: I once saw the broken leaf spring of a truck embedded in the shotgun seat of a D.O.T. bear's vehicle, the photos were posted in the Yuma chickenhouse... anybody sitting shotgun would've been IMPALED by the flying leaf spring section which came right through the windshield. I told that D.O.T. bear, "DAMN, YOU WERE LUCKY, DUDE!!!" And he was too... he nodded his serious assent.
ALRIGHT, HOPE THIS HELPS SOME OF YOU DRIVERS JUST STARTING OUT... EXPERIENCED 'HIGHWAY HEROES' ALREADY KNOW WHAT TO DO, BUT LEARN SOMETHING NEW EVERY DAY, LOL. CHEERS!!!
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