Warning…Warning…
Posted by Pete | Posted in News | Posted on 17-11-2010
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I had to make a trip to the dump today,( which by the way has gone from 3.75 per load to 5.25 per load since my last trip there.) I got behind a gravel truck and he had a couple of signs posted on the back of his truck. Warning…stay at least 30 feet back…and then, I am not responsible for broken windshields….I am not sure I could have read his sign from over 30 feet away and secondly, how can he say in advance that he is not responsible for broken windshields if the rock falls from someplace on his truck? I was behind one gravel truck once on the interstate and I must have been 150 feet behind him…This rock came off the back of his truck, hit the payment and bounced several times heading directly for me…I was able to move over and let the rock go sailing by….That rock was lodged somewhere on his rig, came off, bounced down the interstate for a good ways and had it hit me he would not have been responsible (if he also had a sign…I never caught up to him because I was afraid another rock might come off). In El Paso, on the interstate in about four lanes of fast moving traffic, a 2 by 4 came off a construction flat bed truck and started splintering into large pieces, flying all over the interstate scaring the crap out of everyone following the truck. Truckers have to be responsible for their load, including looking for lodged rocks and gravel. It takes a few minutes, but safety demands it. The interstate is too busy a place normally without having debris flying all over the place, causing drivers to dodge to miss it…..Come on truckers and pick up drivers, check your load…..
Amen! Truckers have to be responsible for their loads, and they usually are. It is usually the “rednecks” in their “cadillacs” (redneck cadillacs) that present a problem. The sign on the back of the gravel truck, the likes of which is seen all over the country, is merely a legal disclaimer, meaning that this truck driver is not paying any damages unless the aggrieved party goes through a lawyer and the appropriate legal proceeding that sues he and his company’s butt off.
If the truck driver can prove that the aggrieved party was “tailgating”, that is an automatic defence for the driver; however, the key is a suitable definition for “tailgating”. I had a police officer tell me once that, at least in Arkansas, the law was not clear on exactly what distance that a driver must follow a truck before it is considered “tailgating”. The driver may be 29 feet behind; he may be 10 feet behind; or he may be, like I use to drive behind trucks in my VW beetle well inside the truck’s vortex in order to get better gas milage. Some state laws may be clear on what the distance is, but many are not. That is the reason a lawyer is probably essential in most cases to address the grievance. To make it worthwhile to get a lawyer, the grievance had better be a good one, like a life threatening situation.