Driving a big truck I typically get one or two opportunities a week to kill someone(s). This week it was a really close one. It
It happened on US 77 (corridor for the future I-69 down there) in Texas on my way to Brownsville. US-77 for most of it's length is a divided highway with a 70 mph daylight speed limit. Along much of it's length it is very much like an interstate except it does have side streets and normal intersections so it does not have the limited access of an interstate. It does however have turn lanes for the intersections though some of them are very short.
Luckily for me and possibly the brain dead woman (most likely the mother) and the two small kids in the back of the crossover type vechicle she was driving I only had 8,000 lb in the 53' trailer I was pulling or it could have been a very ugly scene.
I was going 68 mph (as fast as my truck goes on level ground with the cruise control on) in my 72' long vehicle that grossed approx. 48,000 lb when this woman passed me, then cut in front of me maybe 10' in front of my front bumper then started braking. In a split second, I realized that she was probably going to try and turn off onto a very short turn lane (maybe 30 yards long) we were already right on top of. The turn off lane went to the 90 deg turn into a gas station/conveniance store. There were other cars in the left lane beside me(I didn't have to look in my mirror to know because I already had just a couple seconds before) and no where for me to go but into the ditch or through her vehicle if she was going to do what I anticipated so I really got on the brakes (just hard enough to keep from smoking the tires) to put as much distance between her and I as I could. Sure enough the idiot did exactly what I had anticipated. Not a hint of a turn signal.
I have learned that to be a good safe truck driver one must have the patience of Jobe. You try to drive as if the cars around you each carried your own family members.
The best thing to do when something like that happens is drop it from your immediate thoughts while your behind the wheel. But later, at the end of driving shift when I lay down in the sleeper or at home in bed I review thing like that in my mind to see if I could have avoided the situation.
In this case there was reasonably nothing I could have done differently to avoid the situation and I just thank to Lord that I didn't have 40,000 lb. in the trailer because if I had I think it would have turned out very badley for that family. Even going into the ditch I would have hit the vehicle because she would have been making that turn in front of me and taking into account the terrain and situation I don't think I could have avoided her no matter what I did.
God was my co-pilot and her kids savior.
De Oppresso Liber
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