Life’s a Gas:
The one that I often wondered about was the one about the agency driver who reported for duty at a large parcel firm & was told he was taking an artic on a trunk to Glasgow.
He left the yard as scheduled but never arrived at the depot in Glasgow. The company were unable to contact the driver because they had no mobile number to ring him on.
After two days the transport office got a call from the agency driver. He said that he had managed to deliver most of the parcels on the trailer but was now running very low on fuel and didn’t think he would be able to deliver the rest.
Whether there’s any truth in it I don’t know. Anyone else heard it?
Beautiful!! you just want this one to be true don;t you
theghostofcain:
To be honest, I didn’t realise this one was a myth until I heard it for the 2nd time today.
Driver phones in to the office saying ‘my mirrors broken’.
Transport replies ‘Ok, run in somewhere and get it sorted’.
Driver replies ‘only one problem, the trucks on top of it’.
And the absolutely true story of the night driver who parked his flat in the yard and went home, saying nothing…
Trouble was, it started the journey as a tilt, and all the superstructure was still there in the tree the next day!
Also, at the same firm, the fleet engineer was dragged out of bed by a phone call from the motorway Police at Walsall to say that they’d pulled one of his night trunkers with his lights not working.
The engineer jumped in his car and drove down there, leaned into the cab and switched them on… the driver didn’t know that early 60’s Atkis had the switch panel BEHIND the driver - he just couldn’t find a switch and kept driving. True stories, and I even know the names involved!!
One of my favourites concerns a 21 year old with a shiny new licence who had never been out of Hull in his life. After a few years shunting between the docks and his company’s yard he got made redundant. He blagged a job at the firm next door and his new gaffer finally gave him chance on the road, so he headed off to Dover to catch the ferry.
Long story short, our man heads down, catches the boat, and rings his gaffer, all very chuffed with himself.
Sadly the gaffer wasn’t quite so impressed…on asking where the hell he was and how he was ringing him our man replied that he was on the quayside at Dover, after dropping the trailer on the ferry.
Turns out he should have been under it.
This one I know was true because the lad it happened to told me the story himself - 40 years later.
Life’s a Gas:
The one that I often wondered about was the one about the agency driver who reported for duty at a large parcel firm & was told he was taking an artic on a trunk to Glasgow.
He left the yard as scheduled but never arrived at the depot in Glasgow. The company were unable to contact the driver because they had no mobile number to ring him on.
After two days the transport office got a call from the agency driver. He said that he had managed to deliver most of the parcels on the trailer but was now running very low on fuel and didn’t think he would be able to deliver the rest.
Whether there’s any truth in it I don’t know. Anyone else heard it?
Business Express is now called HDNL, heard that story myself from one of their trunker drivers
There was the bloke who called his boss to say “Ive missed the ferry boss”. “Dont worry” he replied, “you can get the next one”. “No boss you dont understand, I missed the ferry and the truck is in the dock”
BuzzardBoy:
Was told the following story on the Train one afternoon, goes like this…
There’s a Paddy in Jabekke taking a break, and standing behind his wagon chatting to his mate when he is approached to take some immigrants back to the UK, so he says to the guy" Yeah sure, as many as you like". They guy gives him 30k in cash and drives off. Paddy then walks accross the Truck park to his own motor and drives off without any immigrants and 30k in his pocket…
Likely story but the driver who told me swore on his Grandad,Mum,Dad’s etc lives it was true…His mate knew the driver concerned!!
heard that one at jabbeke,was told it was one of muppets drivers who got the cash,he was drinking coffee at the time the deal was done,so it cant be true,who drinks coffee from the machines at jabbeke■■?
I heard a fresh urban myth last night. Apparently you can drive for 12 hrs in any 24hr period and also you can only take 9hr daily rests when you’re sleeping away from home. If you’re at home then it must be 11hrs.
The worrying part was, this came from the transport manager of a large national distribution company.
Longwayround:
One legend here is ,if you are driving up north during the rutting season and happen upon a bull Moose,watch out because in his totesterone fueled frenzy he will charge your truck.Some say the ramming can be severe enough to roll your truck over.
As far as general [zb] goes I have personally met drivers, who have chained up at the bottom of Donner pass, in a blizzard ,in less than five minutes… got nicked doing 110mph at night in Arizona and didn’t get a ticket,…were able to juggle 3 log books well enough to fool the weighstation and their WIFE !!!..drive coast to coast (2800 miles) in 2 and a bit days,…consistently get 10mpg fully loaded in a Peterbrick mega engine,with the windows down…etcetera
Oh and that aftermarket widget they sell that goes in the fuel line,before the injectors,is definitely good for an extra 2mpg
the moose one does have a grain of truth to it. They will charge you if you sound air horns at them, but only if they are stroppy to start with. They will stop if they get close enough to see you are a truck before they reach terminal velocity but if not then there tends to be a big bang and a fair bit of damage to truck and moose. Turn a truck over though? Now that’s a MOOSE!
What’s wrong with coast to coast in 2 1/2 days then? Haven’t you seen Smokey and the Bandit■■?
And I want that truck that does 10mpg. Imagine my fuel bonus!!!
I was double-manning a few nights ago and having pulled out of Gildersome Spur Ind Est heading towards Gildersome island there’s a set of lights which are always on red. The guy who was driving starts flashing his main beam like crazy even though there’s no-one else around.
“W T F are you doing?” enquires yours truly.
“Ah, if you flash your main beam at traffic lights it makes them change quicker.”
“Don’t talk [zb] [zb]” scoffs me.
“No it’s true, watch” and he flashes them… and nowt happens “it’s not dark enough for it to work now” he says.
What a clown. Just in case you don’t know, a lot of smaller sets of lights are set to red both sides until someone goes over the induction loop in the road and that’s what triggers them, not flashing your [zb] lights at them .
Also, putting AOL free trial CD-ROMs in your windscreen stops you getting caught by mobile speed cameras too, don’t you know?
A few years ago I followed a driver from Yarmouth from Swiss to Vlissingen. In Holland he drove on the outside lane of the motorway every time he came to a bridge. On the boat I asked him why he did that & he replied." The sign says` trucks only ." I told him that if he had looked at the sign it was a red circle with a red stripe across a truck. Meaning that trucks were forbidden in the outside lane because the bridges are lower there. He said." I wondered why everyone was hooting me! " He had been doing this for a few months.
seem to remember years ago there being one about a little remote control you could buy which changed traffic lights in your favour, it was said that the fire brigade used them and some bloke down the pub had got hold of some
Roger Breaker:
Was told this one several years ago, thought it was true, but have since heard a similar story from someone else at another company. Amusing nonetheless…
Guy working for a now defunct Diss bulk haulier. Travelling empty round the north circular (or circleeur ) with really bad guts. Starts to get unbearably bad and with nowhere else to stop the guy pulls into a bus-stop, climbs into his empty trailer and proceeds to do ‘his business’ on the floor. Seconds later, a ‘fully laden’ double decker bus pulls alongside, giving its passengers a stunning view of said driver in all his glory! Priceless, as they say.
cartco?..
also heard this about a suffolk based bulk carrier!!
This one that’s sprung up recently about blue light boys. Before anyone starts, I’ll pre-empt you and say Tessa will disagree . However, it’s funny mentioning it to anyone with blue lights on their cab and watching them take them out .
