Many of us ladies entering or who are in the trucking industry didn’t start out at 21 as truckers. Most of us come from another career, marriages and relationships both good and bad, poverty situations and some even have suffered abuse from parents, spouses and partners. A lot of us have grown children and have had to overcome family objections to us becoming truckers, some of the objections strenuous, from our kids, parents, spouses and friends. Many of us carry a lot of internal emotional baggage with us on the road. Overcoming it can be a real chore, but is necessary to succeed.

Women who carry emotional baggage tend to get stuck in what I call ‘victim mode’. These are the women who have survived abuses or tremendously bad situations. Some may have self esteem issues due to their size or looks and cannot see their own inner beauty so because they may have had bad experiences with other’s comments, actions and attitudes, they tend to think that everyone will treat them the same way…badly.

These perpetual victims are easy to spot, they are the women who walk with their heads down, and slump shouldered, who won’t even reply when someone says ‘good morning’. They tend to dress poorly, park in isolated places and hesitate to ask for help even if they really need it.

Little do they know that they are making themselves a bigger target for more bad things to happen to them. Criminals look for these types because it is obvious that they will most likely not defend themselves and because of never looking around, they are not aware of their surroundings. Men who use women go after these types also, knowing that most of these women are desperate for love and a little affection even though it may not appear that way to a non using type of man.

Being a perpetual victim is bad for your work too. You might find it hard to accept responsibility when you do something wrong, instead blaming everyone and everything else for it. Also, because you expect everyone to treat you badly, you might allow your supervisors and clerks to take advantage of you by expecting you to run illegally, or not get you home when you ask. It may be hard for you to take pride in doing the job well.

Overcoming the baggage that we carry is hard. First you have to admit to carrying the baggage. We tend to bury those bad experiences and don’t admit there is a problem from them. It takes a lot of courage to look at one’s self honestly and objectively, but necessary. One way to do this is by making lists of all of your good points then going over it with a best friend, you will find that you have missed a lot of the good points you have. Then make a list of your bad points and again, go over it honestly with your best friend, you may find that you have fewer than you thought.

These lists will assist you in identifying areas that you need to work on…such as attitude, bad habits, choosing a partner, work ethics etc. Sounds easy does it not? It is, if you are totally honest with yourself. The lists will assist you in building some self esteem too. You will see that you are not the terrible person that some might have told you that you were and as you work on your bad points, your good point list will grow. Of course you have to accept that you will never be perfect…but you sure can improve to near it.

If we carry too much baggage and cram too much ‘stuff’ into our emotional suitcases, we put ourselves at risk of that suitcase popping open at some time. This can lead to our over stressing while doing our stressful jobs, or becoming too emotional in dealing with everyday problems. It can lead to health related issues such as heart attack, high blood pressure and diabetes along with mental health issues…none of which is going to be good for you or your career as a driver.

Dealing with what has happened in the past can jump up and distract you in those wee hours of the day when you have too much time to think. Instead of keeping those incidences packed away, deal with them when you are sitting still and can feel the emotions that you have not allowed yourself to feel, accept responsibility for your part of whatever is bothering you, assign the rest to whomever else was involved, forgive yourself and them if you can, and let it go. Otherwise you will continue to be a victim and have overburdened suitcases to deal with when you least want to.

Furthermore, remember; you have chosen trucking as a career. YOU made the decision. That took courage and determination. Somewhere inside, you have strengths that may be hidden in plain site. Use that strength to overcome the past and make your whole life better, take pride in being a lady driver and know that not every woman has what it takes to do the job…that makes you special and unique.

Ya’ll be safe out there!

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Truck driving as a career was not in Carol H’s mind when she was in high school. The girl whose father was a Yale graduate and whose mother was a graduate of Duke University instead was on the college bound fast track. Then fate intervened. Carol got a job driving an ice cream truck. She loved driving around neighborhoods and meeting new people and seeing new places even though it was in her hometown.

Carol started college, but the lure of the open road drew her and in 1970, she climbed into her first semi, a 1960 Auto Car. “I was only 19,” she said, “I wasn’t legal to drive, but we could get away with it back then. The truck had bare metal inside, a crank seat instead of air ride. It was nothing like what we drive now.”

Turning 21 in 1973 gave Carol an opportunity to get over the road. A union company was hiring and Carol and three others applied for jobs as drivers. There were no schools to learn how to drive back then. “I was hired, but at the bottom of the driver board. I had to learn by the seat of my pants and by observing. Because of it being a team operation and me being on the bottom of the board, I had probably 40 different drivers I teamed with,” she relates.

It sounds easy, but it was not. There were very few women drivers in trucking in 1973 and even fewer in union driving positions. “Many of the drivers went out on an unsanctioned strike after I was hired, but not right away,” Carol said, “I didn’t even know it at the time, I wasn‘t notified. The main issue was the driver’s wives not wanting their husbands to run with a woman. One wife even chased me around the plant one night until some of the other drivers made her leave. It made the newspapers.”

“Once I proved myself, things calmed down. The only other time that I faced some real discrimination other than rude comments, was not because of my being a woman, it was because being at the bottom of the board meant I had no choice over who I ran with and ended up running with an African American driver. Didn’t bother me, I am not a racist, he was an excellent driver, but when we stopped in at a diner to eat supper, we were not welcome.” Carol said.

Carol has pulled vans and reefers also, but returns to tankers. “The pay is very good and for the most part, you get paid for what you do, every company being a little different,” she said, “you get excellent benefits usually and are more often home every week than in the other types of trailers. You can have a life.”

In Carol’s opinion, flammable gases and products are more dangerous than other types of chemical/hazmat loads. “Vapors from flammable chemical loads come down and settle at ground levels because the dome is open to unload,” she said. “One day, I was delivering a load of flammable product. I had out warning signs to keep people away. The workers at the plant came outside on break and lit up their cigarettes within 10 feet of my rig ignoring the signs and me! It could have been very nasty; we all could have been hurt! I rushed around trying to them to move back and finally had to send for the plant manager to get them to move away. That was probably the closest I came to be afraid while pulling hazmat.”

Pulling chemical tanker is not a glamorous job. A driver has to wear safety gear beyond a hard hat depending on what the commodity or company policy is. “Full PPE (personal protection equipment) is now mandatory at my company no matter what we are hauling. That means that I have to wear hard hat, full plastic/rubber boots and coveralls, gloves, face mask and at times a respirator.” Carol relates.

A story that Carol laughs about now, at the time was not so funny to her. “I was pulling a load of latex, non hazmat, and a pressure fitting let loose covering me with white latex. Here I was covered with latex. I got upset and called the boss and all he could do was laugh at me. He teased me saying I must look like a prophylactic which just made the whole thing worse at the time!”

There is some physical work involved in pulling a tanker. It takes about an hour to load, but can take up to five hours depending on commodity to unload. A driver will have to climb to the top of their tank, pull hoses in and out and connect them to fittings and place buckets under each connection in case of a leak. Carol laughed, “A good day is when the buckets stay empty,”

The knowledge of hazmat regulations is tantamount in pulling chemical tanker. There are more things to check doing a pre-trip inspection and having to stop at railroad crossings is just one of the intensified safety issues faced by the driver and enforced by the DOT. Hazmat haulers are pulled in for inspections more than other types of truckers. “We have to have documentation of what we just hauled and even if we are under a brand new trailer that has never had a load in it, we have to have documentation to prove it,” Carol said.

After 35 years of driving and 4+ million miles, Carol is still driving truck and taking pleasure in pulling her tankers. She recommends women get into trucking and specifically tanker pulling. “It has been good to me in many ways; I make a good living while still having a life. Driving of course is hard on relationships and health for both genders but with proper care, many of the pitfalls can be avoided. If you decide to pull chemical tankers, don’t get in a hurry or try to take shortcuts, safety is the biggest issue.”

Ya’ll be safe out there!

　

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Women In Trucking Association participates in NTSB Truck and Bus Safety Forum

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Washington DC: The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) held a Public Forum to discuss truck and bus safety. Robert Sumwalt, NTSB Member Chaired the forum with the objective of evaluating the progress since the 1999-2000 hearings and to discuss emerging issues related to the safety of heavy vehicles. The hearings were held over two days (May 11-12) at the NTSB boardroom at L’ Enfant Plaza.

The Chairman noted that the past year was one of the safest years on record for highway safety and showed a forty percent drop from the ten years prior, but he cautioned the audience, “We must remind ourselves that each little data-point these figures represent it means another family member will never come home.”

The NTSB Technical Panel included Chairman Sumwalt and members of the NTSB staff, who questioned the panelists after their presentations. The panelists were comprised of subject matter experts from government agencies responsible for highway safety; to vendors supplying safety products to carriers and bus operators who provided case studies.

Women In Trucking President, Ellen Voie, was invited to serve as one of the parties to the forum. These groups represented government agencies, advocacy groups, drivers, carriers and state agencies. Voie was seated at the Driver and Union table alongside Todd Spencer, OOIDA and representatives from the Teamsters Union and United Transportation Union.

The parties and the technical panel questioned the subject matter experts who gave presentations on subjects including driver health and safety, hours of service, carrier entrant and screening, truck and bus operations and enhanced vehicle safety technology.

“One of my goals was to determine the effect women have had and will continue to have on the trucking industry,” said Voie, “ and I learned that there is very little information on gender related statistics regarding safety or driver health issues. Perhaps we can have more definitive information by the time the NTSB holds its next forum on highway safety,” Voie added.

The NTSB is an independent agency charged by congress to investigate accidents and is led by five board members, chaired by Deborah A. P. Hersman who was appointed to the position by President Obama in 2009.

Women In Trucking (www.womenintrucking.org) was established to encourage the employment of women in the trucking industry, promote their accomplishments and minimize obstacles faced by women working in the trucking industry. Women In Trucking Association, Inc. is supported by its members and the generous support of Gold Level Partners, Frito-Lay North America and Walmart.

The hearings can be viewed on the NTSB website at ntsb.gov.

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