Damn Trucks

[dangerous]

toads: Did you at least take note of the markings/colours on the truck? so as you can at least make the Co of that truck awere of the situation.

Unfortunatly its more often than not the employers them selfs putting the pressure on the drivers, while this does not give the driver an excuse for his driving like your experiance which is toatly unaceptable, the blame cant be throughen at 'all' truck drivers.

I went back to my main profesion because of the pressures put on me as a driver, as much as I enjoyed line haul work which is getting to see the greater part of our country and being paid for it, 20hr days is not good, and I might add that the law only allows 14hr on duty and 11hr driving so untill something is done about these working conditions and the darft log book system then we will see more inserdents and no doubt accidents to come.

ps: I might add however there are profesional drivers out there that should not be behind a wheel.

[Holy Roller]

My bus was 4.2 high 50mm below max height and it scraped on a few bridges, they usually has a height restriction sign posted. The thing was gas station canopies, especially the lights that hung lower, took a couple of these out up north. That was even with a guide indicating it was ok. ( usually the station attendant) Always took it slow passing under rail over passes like going into Whangarei, just fitting under but not got under the one by the radio station, had to go the long way round.

[LB]

Eddie: the Normandale o/bridge on the motorway has no height signs. I couldn't see any signs of the truck hitting it (though it's dark when we commute these days!) - was it the motorway bridge, or the one on Pharazyn Street?

[merv]

If I remember rightly from the days I was dealing with such things, vehicles are limited to a height of 4.25m and all bridges less than 4.4m had to be signposted and have yellow stripes painted on the bottom edges. So if they aren't signposted there should be at least 150mm clearance. The checking of heights and posting of such had to be done annually too.

[Eddieb]

was it the motorway bridge, or the one on Pharazyn Street?

Sorry, should have said, it was the one on Pharazyn street.

[rodgerd]

Unfortunatly its more often than not the employers them selfs putting the pressure on the drivers, while this does not give the driver an excuse for his driving like your experiance which is toatly unaceptable, the blame cant be throughen at 'all' truck drivers.

Do the laws around this sting the company harder than the driver, the way the liquor laws do? Or does the shit land all on the driver?

[jrandom]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the Te Atatu motorway overbridge on this thread yet - a few weeks ago, a truck carrying heavy machinery of some sort that was poking up too far took out the concrete girders over the southbound NW motorway lanes.

The overbridge was restricted to three lanes for more than a fortnight while they reinforced the damaged areas. Traffic pileups were bloody awful the whole time.

[Deano]

Do the laws around this sting the company harder than the driver, the way the liquor laws do? Or does the shit land all on the driver?

Liquor laws now place the onus on the duty manager and the bar staff themselves. For vicarious liability to be proven it would need to be shown that the employer/owner (licensee) either new about an offence occurring, or had not provided the manager/barstaff with adequate policies or resources to enable the barstaff/manager to carry out their functions under the SOL Act.

Vicarious liability for a trucking firm (for actions of its staff) would, I believe be much easier to prove. In fact a driver wronly fuelled up with petrol instead of diesel at a 24hr (unattended) gas station, and ended up emptying all the petrol to a stormwater drain. The company was prosecuted under vicarious liability. (possibly because the driver had no instructions from the company on what actions to take in that situation).

[scroter]

I think someone has covered this. Linfox trucks are all enclosed and are the max legal hieght 4.25m. as roadworkers reseal the gap gets smaller and smaller. it should still be 4.25m at least thoughif trucks are using it but 4.25m isnt really enough if you hit a bump your stuffed. still as a fellow truck driver not stopping is unexcusable.

[merv]

My game was railway bridges and as far as we could see trucks only stopped if they got jammed and we caught them. If they wrecked a bridge and were able to keep going and thought no one had seem them they didn't care going by the number of bridges we found damaged without any notification. This seems to be what the Linfox truck has done because from the description given that driver would have known he was scraping the Normandale bridge and he didn't stop. Did he report it to the Lower Hutt Council? - I don't know.

[Firefight]

[QUOTE=merv]My game was railway bridges and as far as we could see trucks only stopped if they got jammed and we caught them. If they wrecked a bridge and were able to keep going and thought no one had seem them they didn't care going by the number of bridges we found damaged without any notification.

Merv, we may have crossed paths, 1986 ish , I hit the Marton railway bridge at 0200hours, do you recall meeting with a CVIU cop and a young truck driver
white T line inter and 4 axle trailer, the load was frezzer panels for a cool store in palmy, did not appearto damage bridge, but cop and I waited for an NZR engineer guy to come and check bridge was that you ?

Firefight

[merv]

[QUOTE=Firefight]

My game was railway bridges and as far as we could see trucks only stopped if they got jammed and we caught them. If they wrecked a bridge and were able to keep going and thought no one had seem them they didn't care going by the number of bridges we found damaged without any notification.

Merv, we may have crossed paths, 1986 ish , I hit the Marton railway bridge at 0200hours, do you recall meeting with a CVIU cop and a young truck driver
white T line inter and 4 axle trailer, the load was frezzer panels for a cool store in palmy, did not appearto damage bridge, but cop and I waited for an NZR engineer guy to come and check bridge was that you ?

Firefight

I was safely ensconced as a head office waller and we had area guys to go out and do most of that on-site stuff so it was probably someone from our Wanganui office (long since closed). If you had a name I would have known the guy though.

[Firefight]

I was safely ensconced as a head office waller and we had area guys to go out and do most of that on-site stuff so it was probably someone from our Wanganui office (long since closed). If you had a name I would have known the guy though.

sorry Merv too long ago to remember his name, matter ended there, as no damage to your bridge,rooted the tarpaulin and put a nice crease down the top of the frezzer panel, just had to argue with CVIU re ticket,

F/F

[dangerous]

My game was railway bridges

but 4.25m isnt really enough if you hit a bump your stuffed. still as a fellow truck driver not stopping is unexcusable.

Yeah like the one at Sedden (south of Blenhiem) The thing I used to drive was 4.200m high (unladen) and that bridge is very bouncy. I was warned to take it very slowly as hitting the top was a possibility, never did tunnels was my speciality.

Man those old road/rail bridges are awesome, its a pitty they are slowly all being removed.

[merv]

Man those old road/rail bridges are awesome, its a pitty they are slowly all being removed.

Interesting riding the VFR over those ones on the coast - which side of the railway lines to stay on? and watch it as you cross over them when they are wet.

Seddon bridge being a double decker is easy compared to the others. That's up for replacement shortly isn't it too?