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You know the saying “ASSUMING” makes an *** of you and me???
My nephew works lawn maintenance at a golf course here in town. I needed a bunch of dirt to fill in a hole. I ASSUMED since he worked with trucks, trailers, and lawn equipment he was familiar with trailer couplers and safety chains. 🙄
Can you see where this is going?
I back my truck to the trailer, he connects it. He drives the John Deere tractor with the hydraulic bed full of dirt onto the trailer, strap it down and hit the road. It’s only 2 miles from the golf course to my house, we make it bout 1/4 mile before the trailer comes off the ball. I’m watching the trailer roll down the street heading for the only parked car within eyesight. I quickly steer the truck into the path of the trailer and get it stopped literally feet away from the parked car. No damage to anyone's property, my truck unfortunately takes all the impact.
Im normally meticulous about the coupler. I’m picky with the safety chains, lighting, and tying the load down. Not this time. This time I was stupid and careless, I assumed my nephew knew what he was doing.
This could have been MUCH worse, I was lucky I was in a position to use my truck to stop the trailer.
Learn from my stupidity, if the equipment is connected to your vehicle make SURE it’s done right.
Ohhh wow that sucks! Never send a boy to do......comes to mind. At least no one got hurt.
From the look of the damage maybe you could claim to the insurance company that a deep hit you.
That sucks but yeah amen on Never pulling a trailer that You have not checked. I wouldn't be so mad at your nephew. I bet you are mad at yourself for not checking. Bet you will always from here on. Glad everyone is okay.
My brothers son. He really is a good kid, he brought a check over to cover my deductible.
I got some estimates yesterday, about 4K in damage. I didn’t notice the trailer also hit the wheel and gouged it all to hell.
As bad as my nephew feels, I’m far angrier with myself. This was a painful lesson, one I SHOULD have learned many years ago.
About 10 years ago, I installed a jacuzzi tub in our upstairs bathroom. At the time I had pinched nerves in my back, there was no way I was crawling around in my attic to run the wiring. I figured this would be the ideal task for my nephew, he was much smaller, younger, and leaner than myself.
It was about this time I learned common sense isn’t necessarily common. 😡
I cut several pieces of scrap plywood into strips. My plan was for my nephew to lay them out across the ceiling joists, to kinda create a floor to walk along.
Remember what I said about common sense? 🙄
It occurred to me I didn’t tell him what the plywood was for. That became apparent when he stepped thru my ceiling. As I handed him the plywood planks, I ASSUMED he was laying them out to walk on. Nope, he just stacked them up.
Moral of the story: don’t assume anything, and check everything.
I learned, painfully, that ones does not walk bent over across rafters. Threw the crap out of my back. I use kneepads and gloves and crawl now. I can hit rafters in the blown in insulation, boards only needed when I sit down.
I still do stupid **** myself. I've been working construction for almost 40 years and I've hooked up and towed hundreds of trailers. Twice in the last ten years I put a 2-5/16" trailer on a 2" ball (both mine and they were two different trailers). The first time it didn't come off, the second time it cost me a tailgate and bumper
I still do stupid **** myself. I've been working construction for almost 40 years and I've hooked up and towed hundreds of trailers. Twice in the last ten years I put a 2-5/16" trailer on a 2" ball (both mine and they were two different trailers). The first time it didn't come off, the second time it cost me a tailgate and bumper
My Dad did that years ago too. But he did it at a boat ramp. Needless to say, it popped off the hitch as soon as he got into the truck and both trailer and boat rolled right on back into the water. Since I was 15 and stupid, I made the mistake of laughing. That meant that for the next 30 minutes I got to crawl around in cold river water retrieving and dragging the trailer back up the ramp while he sat in the boat drinking beer and laughing at me.
Before anyone comments, no I'm not Hercules. As soon as I got it at least back on the ramp, I ran the trailer's tow cable to his truck and let that pull the trailer all the way up and out. I was 15 and stupid, but not a complete moron.
At work, we have a little double axle utility trailer with a hydraulic power pack on it. It is light on the tongue and uses one of the screw down couplers. I thought i had it tight, but I think it was in a bind when I tightened it down. I was backing up and it it came loose, rolled down a hill an into a big muddy ditch, all in front of our control tower and all of my bosses.....
No harm no foul, But I got a literal round of applause when i went upstairs to explain myself.
Kind of ironic. We finished up a bathroom remodel Friday. I hooked up the trailer and thought about this post as we got ready to leave. I said wait let me check. I didn't hook up the chains. Sure enough I hadn't. I ended up talking to the homeowner and got sidetracked while I was hooking up the trailer.
Only curious is all.My hat is off to you for protecting something that was not yours,and that is substantial damage to your truck.
As a bodyshop owner I work on a fair amount of damaged vehicles that the other party is at fault,or worse yet leaves the scene.
December 9th, 2023, 09:04 AM
