STRAYCAT’S DOGGONE BLOG

Life Day 21621: Seattle Silliness

September 22, 2006 on 11:26 pm | In On The Road |

On Wednesday, the 20th, rejuvenated after my all too brief visit, I recieved and accepted a load which picked up in Brisbane, CA and delivered in Seattle, WA. I didn’t have to hassle with finding an empty trailer because this load was pre-loaded at the Shipper. I left Palo Alto about 1030 and drove the 20 odd miles to Brisbane, hooked to the trailer, and then drove to Corning, CA where I took a nice long break. At 2000, I left and drove to a nice Rest Area just north of Yreka about 10 miles south of the Oregon border where I called it a day. I drove about 350 miles. It doesn’t seem like Oregon is that far from the Bay Area, but it is when you take I-5.
On Thursday, I left the Rest Area at 1000 and drove to Halsey, OR where I had lunch and walk the MMM. I then drove on in to Seattle, parking on the street outside the Consignee’s facility.
Now here’s where the “silliness” comes in. On Friday, at the appointed time of 0700, the customer opened the gates. I was the last in a line of Swift trucks. It took ‘forever’ to get into the docks because each truck had to be positioned in his assigned dock prior to the next entering the facility because there was no room to maneuver. By the time it was my turn, I noticed that the trucks who had just spotted their trailers were ‘bob-tailing’ out. I was under the impression that this would be a ‘live unload’. I was mistaken. After I had positioned my trailer (I had the easiest dock to access because it was on the end of the row of docks) in the assgned dock, I was told to drop it and leave. A Cartage Company was going to move the trailers later. That’s all fine and dandy, except that the Cartage Company hadn’t arrived yet, and 3 or 4 of the first trailers were already empty and taking up space in the docks. I asked if I could have one of them, but was told NO! As I left the facility in utter frustration and confusion, one truck from the Cartage Company was just arriving. As I departed, I saw the “second wave” of Swift trucks waiting for their 0900 appointments. It made absolutely no sense to me whatsoever. Just plain SILLY!!! I drove 25 miles to our terminal in Sumner, WA, south of Seattle, to find an empty. I found a nice new one that someone was trying to save for him/herself. It was marked with a Blue tag on the electrical connector box, which this terminal uses to denote an empty trailer (Red is a trailer in need of repair, and Green is a loaded trailer). It is a good system and should be adopted Company-wide in my opinion. Anyway, someone had put a cargo seal on the doors in hopes of coming back for it later. I called my DM to ask its status because all the rest of the empties I had seen so far were ‘garbage’. She said it was available, so I backed underneath it. I then broke the seal and opened the doors to be sure it was empty before doing the final hook-up. The driver made 3 mistakes. First, they put a Swift seal on it instead of a ’spare’ seal from one of our customers. Second, they didn’t put their Security padlock on it. Third, they didn’t remove the Blue tag. Had they have done these things, they would have had a chance of retaining their prized trailer. I would have passed it by for sure. ROOKIES!! With this prized trailer now attached to MY truck, both physically and by my DM, I settled in to await a PrePlan. About 1000, I recieved a Plan which picked up in Everett, WA (north of Seattle) and delivered at 2100 in Klamath Falls, OR (about 400 miles away). I called my DM and asked if this was the best they could on a Friday, and if it was, where was the back-up Plan? I didn’t want to be empty in Klamath Falls on a Saturday morning with no load. A while later, I recieved a “back-up” Plan from Klamath Falls to St George, UT. Not much, but a start. I then took a second look at the first Plan and realized that I couldn’t legally make the 2100 “live” unload due to the 14-hour rule (my day started at 0700; I could probably get by with a drop/hook delivery, but not the ‘live unload’), so I turned down both Plans and settled in to wait some more. About noon, I accepted a fabulous load. It picked up in Kent, WA and delivered in Folcroft (Philadelphia), PA with 2 extra drops in Buffalo, NY. It is about 2900 miles. I arrived in Kent at 1500. I checked in with the Shipping Clerk and was immediately assigned a door. It took over 3 hours to be loaded. I left Kent at 1930 and drove th Ellensberg, WA where I stopped for the night because of the 14-hour rule. Its good to have a nice long trip with plenty of time to deliver for a change.