Fall 2003 - Interstate 5

Fall 2003 - Interstate 5

Life at 60
by Andrea Jasinek

While some employees dread their daily commute, Paul Geiger lives for his. He rises before the sun and is out the door by 2 a.m., about to embark on another 530-mile roundtrip from Portland, Ore., to Bellingham. Geiger is a trucker.

Geiger, a 33-year veteran of the industry, views life as it whizzes past him at 60 mph. For 14 hours each day, he endures the vibrations of a too-small seat, stopping only when necessary for a jolt of caffeine or something to munch on. Still, life is good, Geiger said.

"I’ve always liked the open road, and this has just been a good living for my family," said Geiger, who makes $72,000 per year. "I’ve just got to get a good night’s sleep beforehand."

Not much can shock Geiger, who’s traveled approximately 676,000 miles on Interstate 5 in the last five years. During this time, he’s worked only the Portland-to-Bellingham route, and he’s seen everything from bare-breasted women bursting from sunroofs just north of Portland to gun fights between cars in Tacoma.

"And I’ve seen lots of ‘sex acts;’ let’s leave it at that," Geiger said.

With an increasing amount of goods moving in 5-axle trailers, like the ones Geiger hauls up and down I-5, the trucking industry is under constant pressure to improve efficiency. In response to the pressure to go faster, drive longer and haul more, the trucking industry has had to become highly regulated to protect truckers, other highway travelers, the highways themselves and the environment.

The Washington State Patrol employs specialized officers who enforce safety regulations for truckers. And when accidents occur, everyone from the Department of Ecology to private cleanup crews respond.

The number of trucks crossing the Canadian-American border at I-5 increased from 469,000 in 1991 to almost 800,000 in 2002, a study by the Whatcom Council of Governments found.

Trucking is thrust into the public spotlight whenever a grisly crash makes the 5 o’clock news, State Patrol Trooper Kelly Spangler said. In early October, for example, a semitrailer plunged from an I-5 freeway ramp near Seattle. Spangler responded to the crash.

"Looking down on (the crash) was unbelievable," Spangler said. "My first thought was, ‘I hope no cars are underneath it,’ and secondly, ‘Was anyone hurt?’ "

In her three years as a trooper, Spangler said she has responded to 30 to 50 semitruck crashes.

According to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, the accident rate among trucks weighing more than 10,000 pounds has declined by more than half since 1980. That year, the FMCSA recorded 5.5 fatalities per 100 million miles traveled. In 2001, 2.4 fatalities were recorded per 100 million miles traveled. Out of 7.9 million registered trucks nationwide, 4,431 large trucks were involved in fatal crashes in 2001, according to the FMCSA.

Spangler said one of the more spectacular crashes she remembers happened in Issaquah. An 80,000-pound tanker hauling diesel fuel crashed, caught on fire and scorched the asphalt.

Ecology spokesman Larry Altose said crashes like these are environmental concerns because of the threat they pose to ground and surface water. Because trucks have the capacity to haul thousands of gallons, a single spill can devastate an area and the cleanup can take weeks, he said.

"A scene that you might see on TV of the broken truck being hauled away and the road being re-opened is very early in the process for us," Altose said. "Lots of these fuel crashes in the news involve testing the soil and possibly excavation."
The nature of the spill dictates Ecology’s level of involvement and how long it will monitor water and soil quality. The process, he said, is never a cheap one.

"The truck’s owners are looking at costs of tens of thousands of dollars," Altose said, adding that the cost depends on how damaging the spill is, what is spilled and what the private contractors, who clean up the site, decide to charge.
It’s important to realize, however, that consumers’ insatiable desire for fuel can stress the industry, he said.

"The demands we place on transporting these fuels is a factor in crashes," Altose said. "I’m not saying that consumers are responsible, but they have a share in what the industries transport and how much."

Preventing crashes is a primary concern for safety regulators, said Mike Southards, a 10-year trucking veteran and current safety director for the Washington Trucking Association.

One of the three most common safety regulations, Southards said, is drug and alcohol testing. Other common regulations require truckers to carry up-to-date medical cards and limit their hours of service — a trucker cannot drive for more than 10 consecutive hours per day or after being on duty for 15 hours, Southards said.
But in a profession where distance pays, Southards said some truckers might fib on their logbooks, though it is not a common practice.

"Hopefully, there wouldn’t be a reason to work more hours than allowed, but most (companies) pay by the mile, so if truckers want to make money, they gotta drive," Southards said.

Geiger, a Roadway Express employee, said working more hours than allowed is more likely to happen when truckers work for themselves or for companies that aren’t union-represented.

"Money is the root of a lot of problems," Geiger said. "(Roadway Express) pays me really good, but some of these guys who own their own rig are under more pressure. … I’ve seen (truckers) so broke that they’re trying to sell dang near everything."

State Patrol Sgt. Scott McCoy heads the commercial vehicle division for Whatcom County. His crew of seven troopers is trained to recognize and control excess, whether it’s excess of weight, speed or hours worked. McCoy’s team is not restricted to probable cause and can pull over any commercial vehicle.

"My guys … can pull over a truck for the sole purpose of doing an inspection," McCoy said.

On a typical day, State Patrol Trooper Alice Collins said she contacts eight or nine truck drivers for moving violations, hours-of-service or weight violations, and oversize-load checks. Her patrol area extends throughout Whatcom, Skagit and northern Snohomish counties.

Oct. 24 was a slower-than-typical day, she said. Between 1:58 p.m. and 3:43 p.m., Collins made only three stops.
After waiting for five minutes at her preferred "fishing hole" just south of Exit 252, Collins clocked a 5-axle, 80,000-pound semi speeding down the hill.

"OK, we got one at 70," she said, hurriedly slamming the door of her Ford Explorer and starting the ignition. "He’s gonna get a ticket for that."

Collins wrote the trucker a $91 ticket.

"This guy was very polite," she said. "You get the ones who yell at you. About one out of 10 give you a bad time."
After about 20 minutes, Collins’ CB radio crackled to life: Her fishing hole had been detected.

"Hey, you got a full mountie getting ready to get on the freeway here," a trucker said through the CB radio.
Apparently, not enough radios were set to that CB channel — Collins pulled a second truck over at 2:21 p.m. for going 68 mph in a 60-mph zone.

Collins cautiously emerged onto the freeway as cars whizzed past her state patrol SUV, which is filled with weighing instruments, a laptop and even a printer.

After a five-minute conversation with the speedy driver, Collins decided not to issue him a citation since he was not going more than 10 mph faster than the speed limit.

Collins made her last stop of the day at 3:43 p.m. A dump truck hauling dirt caught her attention.

"I just want to check and make sure he’s not overweight," she said.

The truck actually was 600 pounds overweight, not enough to warrant a ticket, Collins decided.

Regulations on trucks’ weight exist to protect road surfaces, Collins said.

Even though the thousands of trucks traveling I-5 cause damage to the road, they are there to meet consumer demands, Geiger said.

"Without us, the country don’t move," he said. "Whatever you eat, wear — even your house — at some point, a trucker hauled it."

Geiger said he hauls "everything from tires to bananas." If consumers realized how dependent they are on the trucking industry, maybe they could curb their road rage against trucks, he said.

He said he doesn’t mind all the rules and regulations — what irks him the most, he said, is lack of freeway courtesy.
"Just use your damn blinker," he said.