Reflections of a driver who hates safety meetings…
By Zachary Geroux
April 5th, 2017: A local man was crushed to death while emptying his garbage truck at the transfer station.
For the past week I’ve sat here and wrote, re-wrote, deleted and re-started this article more times than I care to remember. Every time I think I’m going in the direction I want, it ends up sounding cheap, trivial or stupid. I have so much to say about that simple headline above but feel words are an inadequate way to convey my thoughts or the emotions it stirs.
The reason why I’m so emotional about this headline is because I knew that driver. I knew his family and the company they owned. When I first visited them a few years ago, they were very outgoing, hospitable and kind to a stranger who simply had a love for the vintage trucks and equipment they operated.
This very seasoned, 30 year veteran driver made a mistake that day which left his wife a widow and a vast hole in the lives of his family. He was driving a side loader built in the 1960’s. The kind of truck your granddaddy cut his teeth on which required you to lift and throw the trash high above your head into the hopper. While the packer was retracting at the transfer station, apparently he noticed something behind the blade and reached in to grab it. He misjudged the timing and speed with which the packer was coming back and ended up getting caught and crushed.
Where do I go from here? Where do I start? I know what I want to say but it all seems so emotionless. I know some of you are thinking, “If only there were safety switches on the truck” or “That truck shouldn’t be on the road anymore if he can do X.” It’s not the trucks that are the issue; it’s the human decision. A man I greatly respect just recently wrote that trucks today don’t do anything different than the trucks of the 1970s, 1980s or 1990s and I agree. The only thing that has changed is the thickness of the rule book and the cleanness of the manager behind the desk.
All that is Necessary
I’m a driver of the old-school mindset and training. My first truck was a 1980 White cab-over under an Able Body ribbed front loader with cable controls. No safety switches, rear view camera, power steering, or fancy lighting on your tailgate. You never had to go to the gym because you ended up ripped at the end of the day and you learned fast to check if your blade was all the way forward before dumping a bin because experience is a cruel mistress.
I hate that new trucks today are full of computers and safety gizmos that consistently require extra training and support.
I hate the high-vis safety green reflective coverings that you have to wear while your butt is planted in the seat for 8 hours because you never have to get out of the truck anymore.
I hate the constant and repetitive mandatory safety meetings that you’re forced to suffer through because someone managed to find some new creative way to hit something or get into an accident that leaves us all scratching our heads wondering how the hell do you do that?
And I hate that it is all necessary because it can mean the difference between going home to your family at night or ending up at the hospital.
Ever since the United States started publishing reports on the most dangerous jobs in America, the Waste Industry has always been in the Top 10. We read and hear stories all the time of operators being killed, injured or getting into accidents on route. Month after month. Year after year. You can’t open the pages of any industry publication without getting smacked in the face with more safety articles than you can remember.
Yet if all those things I hate, which most of the time takes the fun out of doing the job, end up saving one life, then it is all worth it. Everyone from a 30 year veteran to the green rookie can make a mistake and in a split second make the wrong decision. But if the cruel mistress lets them survive then they come away stronger and wiser. You can’t control the ignorance of people you encounter in traffic. They make your life hell when they speed around the truck at 30 mph while you’re servicing an account or cut you off in traffic expecting you to stop on a dime. We can’t control stupid; we can only control our reaction and mindset going into those situations every morning when we leave the yard.
Understand Your Drivers and Be Consistent
If you’re a driver reading this, take that extra second and don’t rush anything. Be consistent – not in a rush. Slow is smooth and smooth is fast.
If you’re a manager reading this who has never been a driver but have that degree and rule book which tells you how to do things; get out on route and go for a ride along with your crew. See your plethora of rules in action and make the time to do a full day in the jump seat so you can understand what your drivers have to deal with day to day. Don’t drive a desk and then expect your drivers to respect you when you tell them how to do their job.
Accidents happen to the best of us no matter how experienced we think we are or how much time behind the wheel we have.
I’ll close with asking you to keep the family of a little outfit in Twin Falls, Idaho in your thoughts and prayers this month while they grieve the loss of a husband, brother and son. I pray his death was not in vain and that a lesson can be learned from this needless and senseless death and loss of a fellow brother in arms.
Zachary Geroux is a videographer, photographer, historian and owner of Refuse Truck Media and Consulting which focuses on media and marketing for the Waste Industry. He lives in Western Washington with his wife and newborn son who will soon fall in love with garbage trucks. He has been driving garbage trucks off and on for the past 10 years and considers it the best job he’s ever had. He can be reached at (541) 301-1507, email [email protected] or visit www.refusetruckphotography.com.
“When the perishable puts on the imperishable and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:
‘Death is swallowed up in Victory.’
‘O Death, where is your victory?’
‘O Death, where is your sting?”
-1 Corinthians 15:54-55