Not you're everyday ordinary city slicker kinda windy. Were talking
WINDY!!!!!!!
But I get ahead of myself. Floyd and I rolled on in toward the
JobSite. We'd heard that they were playing games
with "detention". Lemme 'splain. Normal people expect to get paid for
"time on the job"...right? Well if truckers
got paid for "time on the job".....we'd be rich. I spend the vast
majority of my time "on the job". Like 24/7 for
weeks and weeks. No customer wants to pay that. Soooo...they have this
fiction. It's ususally something like
"first two hours (on the job site/shipper....waiting to unload/load) is
"free" (meaning the trucker doesn't get paid
anything for waiting)....after that "detention" time starts....meaning
the trucker goes "on the clock" at a certain
hourly rate.
Well rumor has it that "Itsy-Bitsy''s" (Mitshibitshi Heavy
Industries.....the "customer" putting up this wind farm") policy
way something to the effect of "first 24 hours is free .....provided
you arrive before noon.....after noon ......add a day".
That being the case...why get there early? Before noon....even just by
minutes....is good enough.
So Floyd and I stopped to eat.
In Hereford Colorado. It don't look nuthin like Hereford Texas.
Hereford Tx. is a for sure town....maybe even a city.
Hereford Colorado is maybe five buildings and a stop sign.
That's OK though...one of those buildings is a Bar and Grill.....and
they serve breakafast....gooooooooooooooood omelets.
So we ate....and gossipped with the owners. Got some permissions.
(they'll let me park beside their buildilng overnite should I
need too.
It being about ten a.m. we decided to leave.
Windy did I say. Yeah.
A little ways past Hereford we left the blacktop. Gravely dirt road.
Much Dust.
I normally travel kinda slow on washboard dirt roads. Couldn't do it
this time. The wind was blowing about thirty...thirty five miles
per hour....from dead astern.
I have thirty tires. Thirty tires kicks up a LOT of dust. I
needed.....really, really needed to travel faster than windspeed...or I
couldn't see
or breath due to the dust.
So I did. I didn't like it but I did. Bouncing along that washboard ,
narrow, WINDY road at maybe fifty?
Worked. Stayed ahead of the dust.
Until I got to ..................the Hill.
There's a stretch there of really steep road. Possibly (guessing you
understand) ....ten percent grade.
One hundred and forty thousand pounds....even assisted by a 550 hp Kitty
Kat.....doesn't go up a ten percent grade too well.
Sooooooooo.....speed declined rapidly...
.............thirty tire dust cloud caught me half way up the
hill...........
.......................visibility dropped to nothing.
Are we having fun yet?
I 'll tell you onec't my sinuses clear...
We made it...though it was kind of hairy....
Got to the "yard" about eleven a.m.....sat there till about two...(I cut
Floyd loose....no need for him to endure the ordure)...and was
escorted out to a padsite.
At which time I was informed that the Site was shut down due to wind....
(duh...ya think?) ..they'd probably....maybe....start work at around
eight or nine
tomorrow....have a nice day.
Harumph\!!!!
So I dropped my trailer (trucker speak for unhooked from the trailer)
and drove on back to town.
For some reason I didn't go to Hereford...though I should have....but
instead went to PineBluff Wyoming.
Had a nice meal.......lots of Gossip with other truckers.
Went to bed.
Woke up about daylight and headed back to the pad site.
About eleven or so an "itsy-bitsy" rep arrived and we discussed the
situation.
Where they wanted me to put the base just wasn't feasible. They knew it
and were hesitant about asking me to put it there.
Hills. Lots of slope....embankments even. The trailer might turn over.
That would be ................BAD.
So....long story short..........we put it somewhere else.
Got unloaded....closed up.....and left.
BAD happens you know?
Rollover.
One of my trucker-buddies was hauling the exact same thing I'm
hauling...but outa Fargo North Dakota. He rounded a corner on a
backroad.....
and was "helped" by a seventy mile an hour gust of wind. Helped too
much. He's in the hospital. The Truck Rolled. The truck and trailer
is totalled...and
the tower section (Base) is two hundred feet out in a farmers field.
According to trucker gossip....that was version one.
Version two is that the truck and trailer are upside down ....on top of
the tower.....in a gulley.
So who knows? But he rolled it..........or got rolled rather.....we
know that.
BAD thing.
.
.
.
.
.I'm in Ft. Morgan now. Dark.
Fueled up. 225 gallons. $3.20 a gallon....you do the math. THEN
complain about how much it costs for a "fill-up" of gasoline.
I'll leave outa here tomorrow....head back to El Paso for another one.
Floyd's already there.
EvMick.
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