AlexWignall:
I was listening to a driver in the waiting room at Tescos the other day.
He said the he and a few pals went to Turin to steal a load of gold bullion from a security van. One of them was a hacker who fixed the traffic lights to cause a traffic jam.
While he did that the others blew just the back doors off the van and loaded the gold into three mini coopers. After a hair raising chase through Turin, including a circuit of the Fiat factory roof, the three minis escaped the Italian Police.
They later met up with the rest of the group who were driving a coach. With some degree of skill the mini drivers actually drove onto the coach as it was driving along (no wonder our hero decided to be a truck driver in his later career).
The group unloaded the gold and pushed the faithful minis out of the back of the bus as it climbed up a narrow switchback road in the Alps.
Just after they pushed out the last mini the bus driver made a mistake (no surprise there then) and the rear end of the coach skidded out over a cliff edge where it balanced precariously…
Just then, the booking clerk called my bay number so I had to go. If any of you trucknetters meets this guy please ask him what happened in the end?
You’ll easily recognise him, he said he was an ESL Franchisee.
oh yes we have another fantastic tale of heroic trucking good job he was driving cos i was doubled up in hysterics at this one
our hero or Sandy Mcgrab as ive now christened him he was given a job off an agency driving a tipper and had to take some sand to the atomic weapons place in Aldermaston when they were rebuilding part of it and on the way down he stopped at the services at newbury and saw some of his old sas mates who was on their way to test the security there so he smuggled them into the site ,in the back of the truck, apparantly they were hiding under the sand when he stopped for the security inspection and then all hell broke loose when they jumped up out of the sand .
You need to train this guy, I’ve trained my tame agency guy over the last few months and this is the total conversation for tonights shift so far.
19:20. I have unit already coupled up and he arrives
Him - Evening. Me - Evening. Him - What’s the mileage? Me - 374576
19:50
Him - I’m going for the paperwork. Me - Okay.
20:00
Me - What did they put the load as? Him - 70% Me - Ta.
21:00 ish
Him - How’s the fuel? Me - Plenty, we won’t need to stop for any.
23:34, 300 metres from Charnock Richard.
Him - What’s the mileage going to be? Me - 374890
23:43
Him - did you do the clip? Me (now in passenger seat) - Yep Him - Cards all done? Me - Yep, ready to go. Him - What did he say the load was? Me- 35%
(He does legs, lines and number plate on both trailers and I do dog clips on both trailers, swap paperwork with Scottish driver and swap the digi cards over)
01:03 near Stoke.
Him - What’s this idiot doing man? Me - What a ■■■■.
And that’s it so far.
Based on previous shifts the conversation for the rest of the shift will he something like this.
03:30 ish.
Me - What’s the mileage? Him - 3752■■
03:35 ish
Me - Right, see you tonight. (as I head for my car and he goes to take the keys in and download his card) Him - Have a good one man. Me - And you.
if u guys don"t /can"t get the “WEEGIE” scene ,?as one, born and bred , for sure they would have had the lot < and, if vehicle was artic, the trailer legs would have been dropped and the unit ? gone in 60 .>“redistribution of wealth” as i recall the older lads informing me … ah, the sound off the pipes…!!
I was with one of the older drivers at the firm i work for the other week and got onto the subject of what our parents did for work. it turned out he used to live in London and his dad used to earn 1.2 million big ones a year in wait for it… 1978 (working for someone mind)! God knows how they afford the council house they live-in now!?
Was tipping in case new holland at Basildon last week and was cleaning the lights Asian the truck as it was a grotty old day. Another truck pulled up got out said alright mate I said the sain then said can’t be to careful with the vosa about so I just nodded and said yeah. Then he came out with the imortal got pulled up the other week and the legs wasn’t all the way up and they fined me a tenner a turn on the handle. He looked bemused when I said good job he didn’t do it on the slow wind would have cost you a fortune.
Went out to a MAN tractor unit a couple of weeks ago, fault code for brakes was on the dash. Looked it up, fault code related to engine brake control unit power supply (■■?). Told the driver it was nowt to do with the service/foot brake and it was safe to drive. He said “Well I can’t drive it without an engine brake, the runs I do through the pyrinees and alps will burn the brakes out in no time”.
Which I thought was odd, as he was pulling a tipper.
I spoke to his gaffer (through the breakdown club), explained the situation, he said “Alright, thanks for letting me know, it won’t be a problem sending him on his way”. I asked what about the mountain runs the driver does. Gaffer pauses then says “what, between Carlisle and Doncaster, that’s as far as that truck’s been in years”.
I explained what the driver had told me. TM says “take what that driver tells you with a pinch of salt mate”.
I got back out my van to see the driver. Said “your gaffer says he’s happy for you running it back, and it’s safe to drive, so crack on”.
Couldn’t help myself as the driver said cheers as he started to pull away “Mind how you go on them steep Yorkshire Alps”.
Overheard a driver on the boat the other night tell his mates about when he was tipping pallets of milk in nuts corner in a walking floor trailer and refused to tip himself so he used the walking floor to tip it and they came out perfectly onto the bay but the goods in manager wouldn’t accept the load cos it was in the wrong place, so he told him to stick it and drove off but security wouldn’t let him out so he rang the psni and 3 armoured landrovers turned up and the security guard, goods in clerk and the main manager of the centre were all taken away in handcuffs and charged with kidnapping, he’s just waiting on a date for the trial!! Muppet!
Jeesus, had 2 blokes in the paperwork Q behind me today who were arguing over how much holiday you are legally entitled to with one saying on the cpc course he did recently he was told it’s accrued at 1.4 days per month and the other fellow who even started spouting that he had letters after his name as he had a qualification in road transport saying it was 5.4 weeks per year or whatever and and what got me was the length of this back & forth was amazing with both of them just repeating themselves and what they’d just said over and over again between each other, refusing to concede that they may be wrong, I mean who gives a toss anyway, people need to learn to just let things slide ffs.
I nearly started crying as I had to listen to their diatribe and was verily running out of that office once I had my paperwork.
malcolmj:
Right then I used to get up in the morning half an hour before i went to bed…etc etc
You had a bed? lucky so and so, I had a cardboard box but never got chance to use it because I never slept.
Those were the days when wagon engines were so small you had to wedge the loud pedal down and get out on hills and push.
I once slipped over on Shap and had to run seven miles to catch the old lorry.
I was in our canteen during christmas week, on standby with a few other blokes, when one of them pipes up with a tale so dire that i’ve wiped it from memory. So i sat there, nodding and agreeing, whilst watching the tv over his shoulder. I got a call over the tannoy to go to a customer, so I managed to escape… or so i thought! I had been at the customers, sat in the ‘drivers room’, for ten minutes, when the storyteller walks in! It isn’t long before he starts to re-tell the same dull tale of woe word for word. He even mentioned that he’d just been telling it to ‘some bloke in the canteen at the depot’!
Luckily, before I slit my wrists, my trailer was ready. It was at this point that i produced some pink chalk and informed them that I was due a break…
I got told this week the a hospitality company ask a driver to give a Chef a lift in his truck, but not to let him drink as if you are stopped with a drunk passenger you’ll lose you licence.
good job he was driving cos i was doubled up in hysterics at this one
