Hold up in Kansas City

I made my delivery at FedEx 30 minutes early and grabbed the last empty trailer we had on their lot before calling it a night. Yesterday morning it took our crack team at HQ a while to figure out where they would deploy my driving skills, so I waited. And waited. Then, I waited some more.

BEEP! Went the QualCOMM. Head north to Fort Collins for a beer load. No big surprise, and I headed north.

Half an hour later, BEEP! Nope, we were wrong, don't go there. Instead, head back south to Denver then hang a left and head east a hundred miles to the charming little village of Arriba, Colorado. Grab a load ("LOAD WILL BE HEAVY" the satellite unit indicated) and take it to Kansas City, Kansas. I get turned around and head off again.

A few hours later I arrive in the tiny village of Arriba, dirt streets and all. I follow posted Truck Route signs to the grain silos that sit next to the freeway and am told I'll be taking about 22 tons of Hard Red Wheat to Kansas City. The truck and I are scaled to determine the empty weight (remind me to lay off the Fritos next time I ask, k?) then I'm directed around back to the loading facility.

I was expecting some kind of dock setup and heavy, pallet-size bags of the grain. Oh no, that would be too easy. Instead, they have me back up to what looks like a giant nozzle apparatus with the doors on the trailer open and they proceed to jet 23 1/4 freaking TONS of wheat in the back! Right on the floor in a big heap!

That isn't a misprint... the net weight of the load was just over 46,500 which is the heaviest load I've pulled yet for Hill Bros. My gross was nearly 80,000 so it took a while to get the tandems slid to the right spot. The load shifts by itself as it bumps down the highway but I wanted a nice legal scale ticket to show John E Law in case I get pulled in.

This morning as I was pulling in to KC it was 15 degrees out and moderate to heavy snow coming down. I-70 eastbound was a mess and I got delayed for about 30 minutes or so passing a succession of cars involved in accidents on either side of the road. My trusty super singles kept me on the straight and narrow and I made my way to the consignee, only to find out the one piece of equipment they need to unload a van happens to be broken.

No problemo, they tell me, there is another facility a few miles down the road that I can use. Great, head on down there only to find out I can't get my trailer tandems slid back because of the snow everywhere doesn't give me enough force to break the friction and let the slide move back. I eventually figure out a way to solve the problem involving a number of curse words, some neat-o backing and a one-legged duck. Well, minus the duck.

Once my trailer was set, I drove into this offloading building with extremely tight doors (like three or four inches on either side of my truck), got weighed, then backed the trailer on to a special lift device. I detached my tractor and moved it out of the way then this hydraulic lifter thing took over and tilted the entire thing up 35 or 40 degrees! The wheat poured out the back into a large pit and in a few minutes all but about fifty pounds of the cargo was offloaded.

My dispatcher asked if I was still looking for a load out to California... well DUH! I never turn those down. Anyway, he said he'd look into it and while my trailer was doing the unloading tango a new trip zapped in. Do a live load in nearby Independence, Missouri then head up to Council Bluffs, Iowa. Did he confuse CA with CB (Council Bluffs)?

The shipper was one of those in the caves that I'd been to before so I headed over. I don't currently have a broom on my truck and there was a lot of wheat chaff in back still, so the shipper loaned me one of theirs. After carefully sweeping the floor twice, I dumped as much as I could in a trash barrel they provided and it came out to at least 50 pounds. I guess as a percentage it is no big deal to the folks on the last load.

They shoved their cargo on board and I grabbed the paperwork and shoved off.

I didn't have enough hours to make it up to CB, so instead I stopped in St Joseph, Missouri for the night and a tasty Chicken Cordon Bleu sandwich from Arby's. At least I'm staying away from the Fritos.


View Larger Map