A dedicated father tried everything to search for his children privately. Finally, on Matteo James' 12th birthday, a father went to social media to spread the word of his plight. Stephen James posted the following:
I want to say Happy Birthday to my son Matteo. He turns 12 today. I havent seen him and his little brother Zane in 80 days since they were kidnapped to Mexico by their biological mother and maternal grandmother. I miss them tremendously and
I know my sons miss me as well as being scared and confused. Please share this with as many people as possible in the hope that eventually Matteo or someone close to him will see this. Thank you.
The mother of the children was on a supervised visit when she took the children. It is alleged they ran to Mexico with the children. This case, however, takes legal twists and turns from there. The court granting sole custody to the father, Stephen James, is Bell County. CPS and law enforcement involvement from before the children became missing involves Williamson, Tarrant, and Bell Counties. The father lives in Williamson County, the mother lived in Tarrant County. All these municipalities, including the cities within have a hand in. Then, there are the higher ups, due to the nature of Mexico involvement. The issue within all of these municipalities is no one wants to issue the warrant. Every side is waiting for the side to do so. So, as Stephen waits, his children could be anywhere.
The pictures above are the last ones taken by their dad. The children have been missing for almost three months. Imagine if this were your child. Would you want people to scream it from the rooftops for you? If so, help Stephen by doing it for him! Help bring his boys back home. Zane will be celebrating a birthday in November. He needs to be celebrating it with his legal guardian, his Dad!
The only picture found of the mother, Alma Alicia Gomez James (aliases include Alicia Gomez, Alicia James), is not as recent. She's dropped weight, but facial recognition shouldn't be that difficult.
Un padre dedicado intentado todo para buscar a sus hijos en privado. Por último, en el cumpleaños 12 de Matteo James, un padre se fue a los medios de comunicación social para difundir la palabra de su difícil situación. Stephen James publicó lo siguiente:
Quiero decir feliz cumpleaños a mi hijo Matteo. Él cumple 12 años hoy. No he visto a él ya su hermano menor de Zane en 80 días desde que fueron secuestrados en México por su madre biológica y su abuela materna. Los extraño muchísimo y
Sé que mis hijos me echas de menos, además de ser asustado y confundido. Por favor, comparta esto con personas como posibles en la esperanza de que con el tiempo Matteo o alguien cercano a él, verán esto. Gracias.
La madre de los niños estaba en una visita supervisada cuando se llevó a los niños. Se alega que corrió a México con los niños. Este caso, sin embargo, toma giros legales y pasa de ahí. El tribunal otorga la custodia exclusiva al padre, Stephen James, es Bell County. CPS y la participación policial delante de los hijos se convirtió en falta implica Williamson, Tarrant, y los condados de Bell. El padre vive en el Condado de Travis, la madre vive en el Condado de Tarrant. Todos estos municipios, incluyendo las ciudades de tener una mano pulg Luego, están los altos mandos, debido a la naturaleza de la participación de México. La cuestión en todos estos municipios hay nadie quiere emitir la orden. Cada lado está esperando a que el lado para hacerlo. Así que, como Stephen espera, sus hijos podrían estar en cualquier parte.
Las fotos de arriba son las últimas tomadas por su padre. Los niños han desaparecido desde hace casi tres meses. Imagínese si se tratara de su hijo. ¿Te gustaría que la gente lo grita a los cuatro vientos para usted? Si es así, ayudar a Stephen al hacerlo por él! Ayude a llevar a sus hijos de vuelta a casa. Zane estará celebrando su cumpleaños en noviembre. Tiene que ser lo celebra con su tutor legal, su papá!
La imagen sólo se encuentran de la madre, Alma Alicia Gomez James (alias incluyen Alicia Gómez, Alicia James), no es tan reciente. Ella bajó de peso, pero el reconocimiento facial no debe ser tan difícil.
A large amount of truckers have back problems. So, when thinking of ways to help improve driver health and comfort, I couldn't resist tackling the biggest issue I've always had to living in the truck. I HATE the traditional back mattresses. They're hard, springy, and you can't sleep comfortably for a long period of time on them. You can spend hundreds of dollars adding more and more padding and memory foam and down on top of the mattress, trying to make it comfortable. Or, you could spend as little as $100 upwards to several hundred to get the mattress and comfort level YOU want.
So, I went to social media, asking drivers if I could pull the mattress retailers and wholesalers in, would they be interested. The answer across the table was YES! These drivers have already been searching down where to spend their money at for a better mattress. They agree with me; your mattress in your home away from home should be as comfortable, if not more so, than the one at home.
There are a lot of companies on the ledge of agreeing to cater to truckers' needs. Their issue falls into one thing.............they're nervous. They want to come, but they want to see that the interest is there. This release from me is not just standing to show you that we have two companies entirely signed on that want to take care of you, but to let you know that corporate bed companies are now watching. Your likes, tweets, and comments will tell them you want to sleep nice!
There are some revolutionary items that will work perfect with teams that I'm waiting to have them come all the way over. It would allow an almost perfect (let's face it, no truck on bumpy highways will be completely perfect) sleep while your partner is driving. They are the most nervous about coming over, but I love their products.
James McClaskey will start testing another product for beds, to see if it would work in a truck or not.
This could be the start of something awesome. We just need your help, suggestions, and feedback to make it happen. Let us, and the bed companies, know what you need. Like this, and share it with other truckers.
We want you to sleep soundly, quit tossing and turning. We want you to feel better. We want you to not be driving fatigued due to bad mattresses. (Maybe you company drivers can even nudge your bosses enough to make sure you're comfortable also. After all, it is a safety issue.)
How does your mattress affect your health?
From the Back Pain Expert: Anyone who has ever suffered from a bad back will know how much pain and discomfort can be exacerbated by a poor mattress, but it is not just those with existing back complaints who can benefit from a good mattress; back pain may actually be preventable by investing in a good quality mattress and bed.
If your mattress is affecting sleep due to discomfort, it can literally make you sick. Your body is less likely to fight off infections due to a weakened immune system if you're sick. It can also lead to mental illness, sexual issues, lead to a higher rate of accidents, cause early aging, and lead to a myriad of other health issues, not to mention risking the chance of DOT shutting you down for fatigued driving.
What are you waiting for? Click here to check out our mattress dealers so far, and check back often, for we will be adding them as often as possible. If you're a mattress dealer who hasn't been approached, email me. (Contact info is on the front page.)
Anne Ferro's own words, she's "all about safety."
So, Anne, let's explore where the safety is, shall we?
This is a hard one to write, for you have to decide where to start. You have to decide when to tie in the TCA and the ATA also. If I go off track for a minute, please forgive me, for there is a lot to cover in a short span.
BMI
I've taken a look at the BMI standards the administration has been looking at implementing over and over again. You see, a recent doctor's visit had this BMI scale there. If you look at my pictures, I'm fit. If you've met me in person, you know I've got 10-15 extra pounds on me, and this doesn't bother me. What bothers me is the BMI is height versus weight, and isn't factoring in muscle mass. This scale put me at morbidly obese.  This is not morbidly obese! Yet the FMCSA's erroneous BMI scale says it is! In this picture, I'm in a size small Aeropostale shirt. So, in the name of fairness, how is punishing people for being very muscular fair? How is that safe? You'd think you'd prefer a lot more muscleheads, and would discourage the practice instead of pushing them away. According to this scale, the picture above is at much at risk due to weight as the picture below. (Picture courtesy of Ron Pridmore.)
No offense to the man above, but he looks like he'd run out of breath in 10 steps, and is only one stress away from a huge cardiac arrest. My heart is healthy. I run with my dog, and spend two hours a day in rigorous play with Autumn (this includes dragging and picking up a 100 pound pit/boxer by her toy for hours). Maybe, just maybe, before they try to push BMI again, they can figure out a common sense approach.
HOS
They keep trying to change around the hours of service to make them "safer." This is erroneous in so many ways. First of all, in this industry, there never will be a "one size fits all." This is why there are different sets of rules for different aspects on everything but HOS. Household has their own regs, oil has their own regs, haz-mat has their own regs, and oversized has their own regs. Yet, all of these, once again, fall into the same category, with the exception of oil and local haulers, under HOS. Teams fall into the same rules as solo drivers, for the most part, even though the two aspects are literally worlds apart.
Their new safety solution with HOS is going backwards in safety now, not forward. For starters, you can't do more than one reset in a week. I'm sorry, but you would think an administration trying to battle fatigue would make a mandatory weekly reset instead of saying no to more than one. A driver should never be punished for the amount of resets they take. Lou has been known to do two in a week. He's well rested on those weeks, for he takes more time off. This reset also now has to contain two 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. periods, and can only be obtained once per week. First, it was clearly stating every 168 hours, and I'm sure once all the lawsuits are cleared, it'll be shown in the fine print. Let's explore this.
First of all, this mandatory timing of 34's puts in a huge issue on the already dilapidated parking structure in the highway system. If you're one of those who've tried to find a parking spot once the sun goes down, you know parking is at a high premium. This parking situation is so bad, that when complaining of a Schneider truck trying to squeeze his truck and trailer into a 6' wide spot (our 14' wide was in the parking spot), I was actually told by someone who has no clue on oversized loads, "At least you can give him credit for trying." Now, I'm no rocket scientist, but you do the math. These guys who deserve credit for trying is the reason you see so many of the oversized haulers parking their bobtail next to their load nowadays. They are being forced to take evasive action to protect their load. With more and more trucks entering the highway system daily, and fewer and fewer parking spots being available, this time constriction will make it less safe for the drivers, by cutting out many finding safe parking spots. On top of this, it'll force drivers to be fatigued. If they drive non-daylight hours, they will be forced to take a break longer than 34 hours, and will mess up their sleep cycle. If one of these drivers shuts down at 3 a.m. on Friday, they will not be allowed to start up until 5 a.m. on Monday. That'll amount to a 50 hour break just to include the 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. rule. This will also mess up their body's sleep cycle, leading to more fatigue, not less.
The old rules helped household drivers when they needed to load a house, bullhaulers when tending to the customers at livestock auctions, oversized haulers with monster loads to tarp, and specialized haulers who had to set up their loads after hauling or do rigging duties after making it to the job site. You were allowed up to 14 consecutive hours on-duty/not driving after your 14 hour clock was up, but had to take a consecutive 10 hour break after your extraneous on-duty/not driving portion. Now, any on duty time constitutes a 16 hour window. If I'm reading this correctly (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong), you will only be allowed an extra 2 hours now, which will force drivers to cheat on their logs, and drive fatigued to get the job done in certain fields.
Maximum on-duty time within your driving window was 14 hours, which is crucial for anyone who needs to do 150 mile/3 hour load checks (car haulers, flatbeds, specialized haulers, etc). Now, though, you are only allowed 13 hours on duty, forcing you to flag your load checks or do your load checks off-duty.
Originally, the proposal said you could not drive/work more than 8 hours without a 30 minute break. Now, it is 7. I just saw this change. So, if you're oversized, chasing daylight, you are mandatorily forced to stop. This isn't so bad. Everyone, at some point in time, stops, uses the restroom, grabs a drink/snack. That's 30 minutes right there. My issue in this, honestly, is if the governments are going to tell small business owners in trucking when they have to take a break, they have to tell every small business this. This takes away more freedoms than the FMCSA is allowed to impede upon in my opinion.
The only thing they got right is for the teams. The teams no longer have to break the law to sit in the front seat. If you are in the passenger seat for up to 2 hrs before or after your 8 hour sleeper berth, you can log it off duty. This, however, becomes trickier for teams in large companies. Most large companies have went to EOBR's that weren't set up for teams. So, while said team member is in the passenger seat, they can't show off duty until the other member logs out of the system, thus leading them to once again be illegal upon entry into a scale.
In my opinion, the worst part of the HOS, current and proposed, is the hard 14 hour clock. Owner operators aren't plagued so much by this. Large company drivers with EOBR's are. They can't nap when tired. This makes it unsafe. Lou will be the first to say if he has to tread into a gray area and cheat due to the fact he wants a nap, he will. He sees it safer to possibly face a fine than to drive tired. Many will agree with him on this one. People who do not travel in a truck every day do not understand the adjustments a trucker's body had made to their lifestyle, and can't safely tell a driver what's best for them in my opinion. Some days, a driver can go 1000 miles without being tired, the next day, they would only be able to go 90. Give them a soft 14, i.e., they can only work a total of 14 hours in a 24 hour period. Let them rest when they need to. Don't tell them what's best for them, for, if you aren't them, you don't know. Joyce Brenny mentioned a retina scanner one time. This would be mounted to read your retinas, and make you stop when tired. I think this would actually serve better than any act of legislation, for you can go how you need to, instead of how a bunch of pencil pushers think you should.
EOBR's
A major thank you to OOIDA for getting this thrown out the first time. Unfortunately, Ferro is pushing for it again. Are they safe? Are they legal? Is their a safety oriented necessity for them?
EOBR's are a flawed system. Data can be changed, drivers can slightly cheat the system. You see, when Lou was at ATS, we agreed to try them out. We figured out how long we could go in rush hour traffic without having to show driving, how to go out to the boonies in the wind mill sights without showing it, and many more things. There were days that the log would look like an EKG while Lou was low on hours. Why? He cheated for every 15 minutes he needed. These pushed his limits, forcing him to drive tired because he couldn't just stop and nap, there was no way to bump the data that much. He was chastised by safety when the logs decided not to go through, or the GPS in the system would mess up and have us in Nebraska, even though he was logging in from Goose Creek, South Carolina. You see, if the log messes up on the EOBR, you have to have hard logs. This is actually listed in CSA. If you dont' have backup logs and your EOBR messes up, you get points and a ticket, for you don't technically have a logbook. But, if you're doing paper and electronic, you're breaking the law by having two logbooks. Many EOBR's now have you show pre- and post-trip inspections on the EOBR's. There's an illegality here also. According to 49 CFR 396.13, if a driver finds a malfunction during inspection, inspection must be signed. How do you have your actual signature on an EOBR? In FMCSR 395.8 (d)(5), it requires a driver's signature on each log. How do you, once again, provide an actual signature on an EOBR?
DISTRACTED DRIVING
The FMCSA is constantly pursuing stopping distracted driving. They made regulations against handheld cell phones, so now the drivers are more dangerous while trying to hide the fact that they're texting, opening apps, etc. When they chose to ban handhelds from CMV's, they should've had the NTSB push through a nationwide CMV ban for POV's also. How many times does a driver have to avoid the person next to them with their head up their posterior body part because they are too distracted with one of 100 things? Drivers can tell you many stories of scary stuff idiots due while driving, for they see them every day.
EOBR's and Qualcomm's can not be seen when the driver is rolling. So, instead of safe driving practices, you get to see some yahoo at least once a week cut straight across several lanes of traffic and hitting the shoulder to see what their company wants. How did this make things safer?
While talking about distractions though, why are there so many ads and billboards and vehicles on the road with those little scanny things? (You know, those odd, square shaped images that can be scanned for apps or coupons.) How is that not distracting and tempting?
Now that they've started on banning distracted driving, where will it end? I mean, to get a sip of water/coffee/juice/milk is distracting to some. Smoking a cigarette. Scantily dressed women. Radio. CB. Nice cars. Needing to pee. Your load. Your pilot car. Beefy men. Billboards. Smells. Contruction workers. Scenery. All of these can be seen as distractions. Will they ban everything, including scenery? Or will they finally realize accidents and fatalities from at fault commercial drivers is the lowest it's been in a long time, and finally realize their regulations against distracted driving make things more dangerous?
Instead of boring you to sleep, I will make a part 4 with even more erroneous safety regulations they want to push.
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