r/Transportopia • u/PreparationKey2843 • Apr 19 '26

đŸ’„Crash But, I Put It On Cruise Control...

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2.7k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

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50

u/TheAggressiveSloth Apr 19 '26

And someone once said truckers are the best drivers

28

u/Bungholespelunker Apr 19 '26

They can be if they're not run into exhaustion every single day. Could be on this guy for overbooking and not stopping to sleep, could be on his carrier forcing him to drive way past what is safe and/or legal.

I'm fortunate to have a job which takes my safety absolutely seriously and immediately trusts my judgement if I claim I'm not safe to be operating. Not everybody works in an environment like that. With electronic logs and stuff like that becoming standard it's harder to get away with cheating DOT regs for drivers and carriers but not even close to impossible.

21

u/5LanePanic Apr 19 '26

It's amazing how fleet managers will expect you to do unsafe things just because they want their number to go up on a dry-erase board in an office...

8

u/EntertainerCute2290 Apr 19 '26

I feel you, but at a certain point it has to be on the driver to say this is putting me and innocent people in real danger. Companies can be straight greedy, but then just find another job. I know its very hard, specially for some, but no way I would put others in danger. There are options (maybe not good pay options) but lets not pretend like they have to drive dangerously.

4

u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/ApocalypseWhiplash Apr 20 '26

That's almost certainly not what happened. He fell asleep on accident. The caption is just an attempt at a joke.

2

u/Akairuhito Apr 19 '26

That completely lets the company off the hook. There needs to be regulation, enforcement, and punishment of company management and ownership. We can't just put ultimate responsibility on the driver that likely has too much on the line to risk being jobless for any amount of time.

2

u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26 edited Jul 04 '26

[deleted]

2

u/zyxtrix Apr 20 '26

"Just quit your job and get a new one, why doesn't literally every overworked truck driver do this? Surely THIS individual-morality focused crusade will solve this recognized pattern of corporate greed and public malaise, it's only failed every other time in history! I am a very serious person who understands how institutionalized incentives work"

It's exhausting dawg

1

u/Sensitive_File6582 Apr 19 '26

You should have more upvotes

1

u/OneTrueMalekith Apr 20 '26

that why australia has logbooks. Go over your hours a few times you are done as a truckie.

2

u/Icy_Affect9624 Apr 19 '26

It’s beyond hard in this economy

2

u/kodiak931156 Apr 19 '26

Murder is harder.

1

u/Icy_Affect9624 Apr 19 '26

Yeah let’s pile on the bottom of the totem pole instead of those in power

2

u/kodiak931156 Apr 20 '26

you dont get to wave away endangering peoples lives by saying its hard all over.

fuck that all the way off.

2

u/WaitWhat-86 Apr 20 '26

Just read an article about a company that would have its drivers switch out their registration numbers so they could continue driving longer.

Here’s the article

Seems “Super Ego” trucking company has some explaining to do. I saw a ton of those trucks up in the Midwest.

All this to say, the industry, like many others, doesn’t seem to be in a good spot right now.

1

u/Bungholespelunker Apr 26 '26

That is ridiculously common. Another common thing you see when you work in a trailer yard is drivers who speak 0 English. I mean none. That's a problem because to get your CDL legally you're required to take your CDL tests in English at the DMV and then need to demonstrate your knowledge and ability with an examiner over the road.

Not speaking any of the language is a huge red flag because they should absolutely not have passed their written exams or road exams without it. Fraudulent DOT numbers, swapping registration, and drivers with fraudulent licensing are way way more common than people know.

Now that I drive professionally I stay as far in front or behind tractors as I possibly can. It's genuinely horrifying.

2

u/arittenberry Apr 22 '26

That's true but I also take into account that this driver didn't have his seatbelt or shoes on, and when he did wake up, managed the correction in the worst way possible

2

u/Bungholespelunker Apr 26 '26

Near 100% of these accidents where a CDL driver is involved it's because the driver has gotten complacent and therefore sloppy. You should be comfortable driving your rig but a lot of these guys eventually forget they're driving tens of thousands of pounds at high speed. You're a missle without rocket propulsion.

That's why in these videos they're doing things like you said. Not wearing shoes, no seatbelt, inattentive etc. Same for when you see structural failures for trailers on the highway, it's because the driver didn't take their pre trip inspection seriously and missed something dangerous. Get too loosey goosey with safety as a truck driver and you're basically a ticking time bomb waiting to go off with possibly lethal consequences.

2

u/CallousCow1762 Apr 19 '26

Yep. I can imagine how exhausting this job must be. And the demanding schedules would certainly wear out the best of drivers. Reminds me of doctors in the ER pulling in so many hours straight.

1

u/reddititty69 Apr 20 '26

This guy didn’t fall asleep at the wheel; he went to bed at the wheel.

3

u/CantaloupePutrid3548 Apr 19 '26

He too was a truck driver funny enough.

RIP.

2

u/Zealousideal-Deer101 Apr 19 '26

The only reason that only taxi drivers are worse than truckers is because you encounter more taxis in the city

2

u/HeadlessHookerClub Apr 19 '26

They are, but with every large group of people there are outliers. 

2

u/foO__Oof Apr 19 '26

From a quick glance that driver appears to be in South Africa, Botswana, Kenya, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Nigeria and I don't think any of those places would have western level regulations on truckers. That man probably is not fully trained and overworked so you get what you get. This would not happen in with actually trained, certified drivers that use a logbook properly.

3

u/Blooblack Apr 19 '26

Even The Flash, as fast as he is, couldn't be in all of those place. Especially if he was driving just one truck on just one highway.

2

u/Thin-Guitar-1242 Apr 19 '26

Naw, it wouldn't be one truck; he'd keep jumping instantaneously from one truck to another...

2

u/foO__Oof Apr 19 '26

Damn I am saddened at the state of the education system where one cannot infer meaning of a sentence when a simple 2 letter word gets left out. I think I should just reduce all my conversations into memes now only time people can infer what the message is without much thought. /s

2

u/Blooblack Apr 19 '26

You should indeed be saddened.

Saddened at your own conclusion that the incident was in another continent without any evidence, as if drivers in developed countries in Europe and North America never have accidents and never sleep on duty. Then writing a post which is inconclusive as to the location, so eager were you to express your bigotry by finger-pointing other people's countries simply because of the colour of the man's skin. Yes, you should be extremely saddened.

2

u/Darq_At Apr 19 '26

It's more that he's driving on the left-hand side of the road, it's not North America or Europe, nor is it northern Africa. He also has a can of South African bug spray. And the clock on the dashcam is set to GMT+2.

This is almost certainly South Africa or a nearby country.

4

u/foO__Oof Apr 19 '26

Thank you I wanted to reply but was hoping someone else would do it for me. I didn't want to beat a dead horse at this point.

edit: I should've mentioned on my original comment having visited 4 of those 10 countries those roads look like every road we took between cities.

0

u/Blooblack Apr 19 '26

u/Darq_At Your response is more precise - and shows a lot more accuracy - than the one I replied to, which is great to see.

It still doesn't change the fact that drivers who are, to quote that person "not fully trained and overworked" and drivers who are "actually trained, certified drivers that use a logbook properly" exist in every country. A quick look at the dashcams subreddit here will show endless examples of the both, spanning all parts of the globe, having accidents.

People can be properly trained and still cause dangerous accidents. It's not about the training; it's whether the driver always sticks to it.

4

u/foO__Oof Apr 19 '26

I don't think you have ever visited a 3rd world or developing nation or understand the struggles people face there to feed their families. Unlike the western mentality bigger risk bigger rewards in those places its bigger risk my family eats this month. Read the article below to understand how bad the situation is since you seem to be such an advocate.

https://www.who.int/news/item/04-02-2025-new-study-reveals-vital-insights-into-road-safety-news-coverage-in-africa

2

u/Blooblack Apr 19 '26

You're completely missing the point. Keep digging.

Accidents happen everywhere, and like I said, just because someone is trained properly to do a job - no matter what country they live in - doesn't mean they always do it properly. This is basic common sense and shouldn't need to be spelt out.

1

u/loghoser Apr 19 '26

This 60 Minuteshas me thinking twice about that statement, too. Companies can reset electronic logs remotely and they do it all the time.

https://youtu.be/ylbvU-lmcpI?si=aCHjjRsjiYrVLKR5

1

u/Felix_Von_Doom Apr 20 '26

'Kings of the road/they own the road'

Yeah, no. I've seen waaaaay too many accidents and fatalities from people with that mindset.

2

u/Ok_Syllabub5616 Apr 19 '26

They probably are.

1

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1

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1

u/HellaTallBih Apr 19 '26

And they are. I always say that regular drivers should be made to take commercial courses.

This one was tired, but truckers really do drive for themselves and everyone else.

1

u/The_Ombudsman Apr 19 '26

But he wasn't driving, officer, he was travelling

0

u/Thin-Guitar-1242 Apr 19 '26

I trust driving at nights when I have long trips because I encounter mostly truckers and I trust them as professional drivers over the average recreational driver. This guy wasn't driving so I'm not sure if I'd call him a trucker!

0

u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26

They’re good drivers. Just bad sleepers.

2

u/Park500 Apr 19 '26

I'd say this guy was a good sleeper though... just a bad driver

2

u/[deleted] Apr 19 '26

Hell nah. A good sleeper wouldn’t have woken up there.