Hi All, Today was the day to ask myself, what am I doing out here. I drove 280 miles on sheet ice. The load I picked up in Indianapolis, Indiana was suppose to weigh 42 thousand pounds. That would put me at about 78 thousand pounds gross. When I got to the shipper, I was clean up on a load balance that would not fit on the other truck. Having a lot of weight helps you get traction and keeps you from being blown off the road. My load weighed 5000 pounds. That means no traction and I am a big target to the wind. It was a normal trip from indy, all the way till I hit Wyoming. I drove about a 100 miles into Wyoming and had to park for the night. When I woke up at 3am, everything was frozen. I decided to wait for the sun. There was gust's up to 40 MPH. I lost count of how many times my trailer tried to swing over to adjust my mirror. (jackknife) All day long I saw semi trucks laying upside down and twisted. I kept thinking that I should join the war. It seemed safer at the time. Between the 2 inches of sheet ice, the blowing ice and snow, lets not forget about the black ice. It was my first trip in a tractor trailer in the snow and one I will remember always. 2 drivers were killed and one lost his right arm and leg. It was a real wake up call to me. I'm just glad I had the mountain driving experience that I got in Oregon when I worked for Van's. It is a strange feeling when you are driving straight down the road and in one second, you are fighting with everything you got to get it back under control. On a bright note, I'm safe at our terminal in West Valley City, Utah. It's part of Salt Lake City. I will get up in the morning and deliver my load. I should be heading to Phoenix on my next load.

Still alive!
Jeff

For some reason my post went out of order. If you scroll down to the Wyoming sign and work your way up it might make the story seem somewhat in order.

Last hill before Utah.Old railroad water tower.

Welcome to Utah.


20 miles to go.

Home stretch.

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Getting bad.


Getting worse.

WORSE.

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I was BBQ'ing last night and when I went back out to cook some flour tortillas my propane tank on my BBQ froze. I scratched Hi on it.

Bad picture, but temp says 17 degrees.

This was a gravel parking lot when I parked. When I woke up it was a sheet of ice.

Let the real fun start.

This is blowing ice. Makes driving a blast.

Where the fun started.