Trucker struggles with backing his rig

Have you ever thought about becoming a truck driver? All those thoughts about the glorious life of travelling from town to town, city to city, state to state! Heck, you may even be able to become an international traveller ! Look at it this way, how hard can it be? Almost everyone has a drivers licence right ? “ I drive a car, i am sure i can drive that rig, it isn’t brain surgery”. Then again, i am sure some brain surgeons also say after years of school, and many more years of practical training if you can call it that, their job too” is a piece of cake” in a matter of speaking. But of course we all know, the brain is an amazing and strange thing, so we can’t compare brain surgery to truck or any other type of driving a vehicle on our roads of today. Onto the main subject here, driver training is a very real and important part of driving whether it be for a daily commute or transporting products to our stores and warehouses. Starting out in the driving world as teenagers many take lessons. These lesson or training build basic skills for becoming a safe and alert motorist, some learn faster than others. We have all seen this on the crazy highways and byways we transit daily. Family transporters or “cars” if you like, take us here and there. To sports games, work, theatre, and also maybe just for a little scoot to the countryside for some r & r . This is not the case for the PROFESSIONAL DRIVER.Yes there is such a term. The professional driver comes in many forms, today we are targeting the commercial truck driver. He or she has taken on a challenge… to transport products from point A to point B in the safest and most efficient way possible. Of course to take on this career as a professional driver one needs a standard drivers licence. Once that is accomplished, training is a definite . Learning all the systems of a BIG RIG ,how they work, the mechanics behind all those wheels and GIANT engines, and how to make sure “your” rig is ready for a day of safe travels. After the in class time, there is also a required number of hours of “on the road practice”. This actual time may vary from state to state and country to country. A class 1 drivers licence allows one to drive semi-trailer trucks as well as all other classes of vehicles 1 through 5. These being buses, smaller commercial trucks, taxis with restrictions, and the ability to drive ambulances. Of course for an ambulance it is most likely you need to be a paramedic, but that is another subject. And of course class 5, the main class of licence for driving our personal family cars, light trucks and the infamous family mini van. Well, in the video you are about to enjoy, Dale our videographer is one of these highly skilled professional drivers. Dale drives the BIG RIGS, as well as he is a heavy equipment operator. During his day, he enters and exits many storage yards and commercial properties. Not all these locations are a drive in and drive out location. Some require backing into a loading / unloading bay or backing out of the entire complex. Here we see a bit of two struggles for a commercial driver. These being a lack of skill as well a lack of situational awareness. In the end, Dale mentioned “this driver could have simply driven out of the yard, just as he drove in”. “ There is plenty of room to turn around inside the property”. Enjoy but remember “ we all have to learn at some point”. Be patient of those in training and learning, we were there as well!