Im only 24 but iv learnt that as has been said if your tired then sleep sod the deliveries…i started doing a night trunk last week but allready had to turn down work because i didnt feel safe and i told the boss that and he thought that was reasonable enough any manager that doesnt is a [zb]…
Im glad your colleagues are ok THM
Stay safe out there
I went from driving a 7.5 tonner which was unlimited to one that was limited and i was amazed at how tired driving a limited vehicle makes you, nothing to stimulate your mind like when you have to constantly move in and out of lanes when passing, speeding up and slowing down with the traffic when you drive an unlimited vehicle. With a limited one, there is nothing, you rarely pass anyone and conctantly stare at what is in front for mile after mile
I do worry about my brother who is a HATO in the M4
nickyboy:
I went from driving a 7.5 tonner which was unlimited to one that was limited and i was amazed at how tired driving a limited vehicle makes you, nothing to stimulate your mind like when you have to constantly move in and out of lanes when passing, speeding up and slowing down with the traffic when you drive an unlimited vehicle. With a limited one, there is nothing, you rarely pass anyone and conctantly stare at what is in front for mile after mile
It’s a matter of personal perception - Some like me can sit in the passenger seat and not get bored.
It’s just a case of adjusting and focussing on other driving issues
if we tow people off we will take money out of their pockets which isnt fair.
Isn’t fair?
That has got to be the most stupid comment regarding road safety…ever!
Maybe there are rules to say that you cannot tow off a vehicle but the above is not a valid reason.
del949:
if we tow people off we will take money out of their pockets which isnt fair.
Isn’t fair?
That has got to be the most stupid comment regarding road safety…ever!
Maybe there are rules to say that you cannot tow off a vehicle but the above is not a valid reason.
I think he means that the recovery company have gone to great expense to equip themselves for motorway recovery, it wouldn’t be fair on them relying on work which they get paid for, that we would do for nothing by taking them to a place of safety. We are not allowed to recover full stop and we now have a recovery contract in place that removes vehicles that haven’t got their own recovery on our behalf and the charge is passed to the motorist.
ROG:
nickyboy:
I went from driving a 7.5 tonner which was unlimited to one that was limited and i was amazed at how tired driving a limited vehicle makes you, nothing to stimulate your mind like when you have to constantly move in and out of lanes when passing, speeding up and slowing down with the traffic when you drive an unlimited vehicle. With a limited one, there is nothing, you rarely pass anyone and conctantly stare at what is in front for mile after mileIt’s a matter of personal perception - Some like me can sit in the passenger seat and not get bored.
It’s just a case of adjusting and focussing on other driving issues
Rog there’s a big difference between sitting in the passenger seat for a while watching the world go by and driving a 400 mile+ night trunk at 85kmh on an empty motorway or driving at 85 kmh on a busy motorway for the last 4 hours+ of a 12 hour+ spreadover.
dogthehunter:
Im only 24 but iv learnt that as has been said if your tired then sleep sod the deliveries…i started doing a night trunk last week but allready had to turn down work because i didnt feel safe and i told the boss that and he thought that was reasonable enough any manager that doesnt is a [zb]…
Turning down nightrunking would have put me on the dole from when I was 25 to 40 and the boss could’nt care less because he’ll just find someone else to do the job.I did’nt know many managers who were’nt bxxxxxxs but if everyone turned down night work because it’s tiring sometimes then the whole country would seize up.But those night trunks would be a lot less tiring if they could be done at a 60 mph limiter setting because you’d get home sooner.
Carryfast:
Rog there’s a big difference between sitting in the passenger seat for a while watching the world go by
Never do that - what I meant was doing everything I would be doing as a driver but not actually driving.
Highwayman,
I did accept that there may be a rule that stops you towing off a stranded vehicle, but to suggest that the not towing off policy is correct becasue its “unfair” is ridiculous.
Whilst not having a go at anyone doing your job (or blaming them for the policy) it is patently wrong that someone should be left in danger simply so a recovery company can make their profits.
I realise that in todays world there is probably a raft of H&S legislation that prevents you recovering a vehicle to a safe place.
Are you allowed to tow it from a live lane onto the hard shoulder if safety demands it 
We are trained in carriageway clearance, providing the vehicle can be dragged to a place of safety on the hard shoulder, we will clear it from the carriageway. If the vehicle is so badly damaged that it will damage the surface of the road, we will just cone off the lane and wait for a recovery vehicle with a hiab. 
ROG:
Are you allowed to tow it from a live lane onto the hard shoulder if safety demands it
The Highway Man:
We are trained in carriageway clearance, providing the vehicle can be dragged to a place of safety on the hard shoulder, we will clear it from the carriageway. If the vehicle is so badly damaged that it will damage the surface of the road, we will just cone off the lane and wait for a recovery vehicle with a hiab.
That makes sense - thank you
The Highway Man:
Just to bring this to every-bodies attention, the vehicle that was hit has now been made part of an advertising campaign, please be careful out there if you have to stop on the hard shoulder.
Is that for a public advertising campaign Mr H/Man or just our office wall as part of a H/S drive .
Look on the bright side at least there’s photographic evidence and admitance a vehicle has been hit 
(unless it’s a photoshop reconstruction 
), the way things are covered up (until it’s investigated 
) i’m surprised it has been shown, i thought there was somewhere in the region of approx 15 vehicles having been hit .Nothing official comes out, just heresay and rumour 
. The radio went doolally last time a BIB car got took out by another dopey MOP in a fully lit VMS’ed area .
My nearest brush was with a Polish LGV running a good 1/3 to 1/2 way across the H/S just after we stopped for a routine breakdown, first i knew was when he virtually brushed the wing mirror of the car in front, it certainly focussed the mind (Last time i saw that happen was following johny Brit on Sat evening, before i met another lefthooker having a tacho break 2 miles prior to services do they have a death wish or are they just bone stupid )
Recovery operators profit would be just the same whether they recovered a vehicle from the hard sholulder next to the live m/way or from the relative safety of the h/s at the top of a slip road.
speedyguy:
Is that for a public advertising campaign Mr H/Man or just our office wall as part of a H/S drive
Either way, it’s a hard hitting way of getting the message across to get out of your vehicle.
reading the thread again set me wondering if in fact Elf and safety is best served by not towing off the broken down vehicle.
Obviousley I have no idea how long the HATO had been parked , but I have got to wonder if they had towed the stranded vehicle off, would the HATO men have been safer as well.
Seems to me that someone in authority really has got their wires crossed.
They’d only just pulled up and had been there a matter of minutes when the vehicle got hit. Luckily both HATO’s got out as soon as they stopped.
Mike-C:
Is there really a need for a HATO and or his vehicle to sit on the hard shoulder with a broken down motorist?
With reference to HATO stopping behind broken down cars, most of those that HATO’s stop with for any length of time are;…
A) Either “persons at risk” and the HATO will do their level best to keep them as safe as possible, that could mean taking Mum & kids off, Dad stay with the car until recovery arrives, who can then pick up the rest of the family from the local Cafe, or putting out cones and signs behind the vehicles.
B) People who have no recovery method, and the HATO has to sort things out for them, that can include making phone calls for them, or getting us in the RCC to arrange Facilitated recovery through the HA “Duty garage” (FMG) (This often in the case with foreign visitors to our shores) once it’s all sorted, the HATO will leave it.
C) Vehicles that have been severerly damaged in RTC’s, and require immediate removal from the network. This is arranged by the HA “Duty Garage” and the HATO must stay on scene (unless called to an immediate job) until it’s recovered. Whilst it doesn’t stop the “rubber-kneckers” it does stop people keep ringing it in on 999 etc.
D) Vehicles that have “nervous” animals in, ie horse boxes, or nervous dogs etc. anything that could somehow get out onto the c/way, or other actions may need to be put into place to get them recovered.
If a HATO patrol comes across a broken down vehicle, they will stop with it, make sure all the occupants are OK, obtain vehicle & driver details, confirm that recovery has been arranged and the ETA, providing there’s no problems, they will then give safety advice about where to stand etc, but if the occupants ignore that, there’s nothing they can do about it, they then leave the vehicle, they’re certainly not going to stay and baby-sit the vehicle just because the occ’s won’t get out and behind the barrier.
A number of the recovery services will call the RCC to inform us of their members broken down in our area, we will then inform the patrol that covers the route this would be on, if there are no issues, and it’s just a “standard” recovery with recovery ETA known etc, the HATO will give it a glance as they pass to make sure it looks safe enough, but doesn’t even need to stop at it at all.
One of the biggest problems we have, is drivers running out of fuel. Some of the recover service providers will not attend these people, as it’s deemed “self-inflicted” so then we have pedestrians walking down the H/S. and an abandoned vehicle.
hitch:
if theres some thing on the hard shoulder use the next lane
A sensible comment, it’s what they used to do when I used to do the continent & it’s law in the USA, if there’s an emergency vehicle on the shoulder you have to move over, most drivers will do it for breakdowns too, so much safer.
I’ve seen far too many accidents where people have hit something on the hard shoulder in the last few years, I can think of at least 10, it seems as though it’s a new phenomenon though as I don’t remember seeing it that often years ago, one that sticks in my mind is the following incident. I was following a Magnum around the m25 a while back, he was doing 85kmh so as I was doing 90 I pulled out to overtake, the bloke was wobbling around all over the place so I dropped back instead, I had a feeling he might take me out, now I’m not a timid driver by any means, but this bloke was all over the place, anyway two minutes later he was knocking emergency phones down & took about 200yds of barrier out, I stopped behind him to check if he was ok, my first thought was he may have had a heartattack or something, but he was ok, he reckoned he got a blow out which dragged him over, funny thing was I never noticed it as he swerved from the middle lane to the hard shoulder, a Magnum with a front blowout leans at quite an angle so I would have noticed, the bloke had eyes like ■■■■■■■■■ in the snow, lucky for him he did end up with a flat, hitting the concrete block that got uprooted when he took the 1st phone out saw to that, probably saved him from getting nicked
In the past if ever I broke down or had a puncture on the motorway I would jump in the bunk, not now though, I’d find myself a bridge pillar to hide behind & tell the fitter/tyre man to bring a new mirror with them, then I could replace the one that would inevitably get smashed by some idiot hitting it while i was on the hard shoulder
I know the HATOs can be a pain at times when they shut lanes off for what we consider to be no reason , but when you have things like this happening you can understand why, maybe next time you sit in a traffic jam because they’ve coned off 25 miles of inside lane for a car with a flat tyre you’ll remember this incident & see why it’s done, they want to get home in one piece too
Would I be right in thinking that there is a move for HATOs to cone off lane 1 every time there is a vehicle on the hard shoulder
