Trucking Safety

Distracted Log Truck Driver Dies After Treelength Load Crushes Cab During Rollover

BACKGROUND: A log truck driver was traveling on a paved road in the Southeastern U.S., hauling a load of treelength pine pulpwood to a local paper mill. It was their second load that morning. Weather conditions were mostly cloudy, with a temperature of 55° F. A light rain occurred earlier in the day. Weather was not believed to be a cause for the accident, although it could have potentially contributed to the rollover once the truck entered the ditch after leaving the road.

PERSONAL CHARACTERIS-

TICS: The driver had almost three years of experience driving for their employer at the time of the accident and had a valid Commercial Driver’s License.

ACCIDENT: The logging business owner indicated that the driver secured the load with binding straps prior to entering the roadway. A driver-facing and forward-facing dash cam was installed in the cab. Video footage confirmed that the driver was traveling 35 mph at the time of the accident and was not wearing a seatbelt. After traveling approximately 1.5 miles from the logging deck, the dash cam footage shows the driver beginning to cough and reaching up to adjust the heat settings inside the cab. When the driver took their right hand off the steering wheel to reach for the temperature control settings, the truck drifted to the right and traveled off the paved road and into the ditch. There was no shoulder present on this section of the road, and there was a 3-inch drop off from the pavement to the ditch. The ditch was soft and slightly muddy from the rain that had fallen earlier in the day. As the truck left the road and entered the ditch, it overturned onto the passenger side. While overturning, the treelength pine load continued to travel forward, pushing the aluminum headache rack into the rear of the cab.

INJURY: The driver was crushed between the seat and the steering wheel. A passing motorist called EMS and then stopped by the logging deck to notify the crew of an accident a short distance away. When the crew arrived at the accident scene they discovered that emergency responders were working to extract the driver. The driver was initially alert and communicating with emergency personnel. It took approximately 30 minutes to extract the driver from the wreckage. The driver remained conscious for about 20 minutes of the extraction period, but was unresponsive when pulled from the overturned truck. After immediately attempting CPR, the driver was pronounced dead at the scene. After cleaning up the pulpwood post-accident and delivering it to the mill it was determined that the load was within legal weight limits. Inspections were current for both the cab and trailer. It was also determined after the accident that the binding devices used were the handratcheting type and hooked onto the trailer, not the trailer-mounted binding system designed to properly secure the load.

UNSAFE ACTS/ CONDITIONS:

l The driver was operating a moving vehicle while distracted l The driver took their eyes off the road and did not maintain two hands on the steering wheel during operation l The driver was not wearing a seatbelt

RECOMMENDATIONS:

l Heavy-duty steel headache racks should be mounted directly onto the trailer to keep shifting loads from gaining momentum and becoming projectiles during an accident l Always use an appropriate load binding system designed to safely secure a load during transport

6 ➤ with zero. We built a prototype, something we didn’t know anything about, grew it and pretty soon we were building a bunch of them. This time it is a little different because we jumped in with existing production going on. You’ve got to take care of all those products you’re shipping. We don’t want to be shipping product that the customer can’t make money with. Because once you cash a guy’s check, you have a responsibility to him.”

Changes

Speaking of the product, it’s inevitable that there would be some changes to the line, like name and nomenclature, the numbering of different machines, and so on. According to Jared Dunn, Weiler Forestry sales manager, all Weiler Forestry products are sold under the Weiler brand name, to maintain consistency and grow brand awareness.

All, that is, but one exception. When Weiler acquired Caterpillar Forest Products in 2019, the Prentice brand name came with the deal. Weiler continues to sell one type of Prentice-branded loader: the 2124 A-frame knuckleboom loader, the kind often mounted on cabs or trailers for self-loading. “Prentice built a legacy with the A-frame loaders since 1956, by listening to customers,” Dunn says. “The Weiler manufactured Prentice 2124 continues that history.”

Change isn’t in name and paint only. There have been engineering/design changes—about 90 to the skidders alone. It all stems from trying to be responsive to customer feedback. “If anybody said they didn’t like something, we corrected it,” Weiler says. “Some of those are pretty small changes like adding or taking away a gusset, moving a grab handle or a hose.”

Sean interjects here: “He says it’s small, but, for us, it’s a huge thing, because he can get it done like that,” he says with a snap of his fingers.

How can this smaller company react so quickly to input from operators? “If I built something like skid steer loaders, or excavators or dozers, it would be a big mess,” Weiler explains. “That’s high volume, and I’m not good at that. I am better at the niche type stuff. When you’re in that mode you can be more flexible. The forestry business is a much smaller universe so we can control what we are doing better from a parts standpoint.”

By the way, Weiler is quick to point out, he’s not the one making changes; it’s the engineering guys and the production guys. “Bill and I just try to stay out of their way and let them do what they do.” He and Bill Hood do now what they did with paving: visit the customers, like he was doing this week in Mississippi with Sean Doyle, listen to them and learn how to improve their product. Then they bring that back to the design team. “I like talking to engineers about what they’re doing and I just try to keep the guys focused on developing product based on what the customer wants.” Very often, he says, the engineers already know, and they’re already on it.

Economy

I wonder if it was unfortunate timing, getting into a new industry months before a global pandemic and its fallout, but Weiler says the impact is only short term. Sean concurs: logging and construction equipment sales have been very active. “We can’t keep anything in stock; we sell it almost before we get it,” he says. “There’s a housing shortage; people need wood products, bad. They need equipment to produce that raw material to make that final product.” To me, I add, it looks like the economy is actually booming. “In our world, it is,” Sean agrees. “We’re as busy as we’ve ever been.”

“Who says there’s an economic slowdown?” Weiler asks rhetorically. “I don’t see it. Do you see it? If I owned a restaurant I’d probably see it; I’m sure there are pockets. In what I deal with—and again it is a very small world I live in—all the way through Covid, people kept using equipment and wearing it out. They aren’t buying stuff because they just want to buy stuff; they’re wearing stuff out.”

The supply chain is under stress, Weiler admits. “I think a lot of people blame Covid but it really goes back to supply and demand. The demand is so high, no supply chain can keep up with that, and then you add a Covid production slow down on top. I think it will normalize over time. It is just a little overheated.”

He predicts, “People will overbuild eventually and be stacked with inventory. Interest rates go up and then it will stop for a year, then it will be a big crisis. So we are trying to be a little more even keeled about this.” Sounds like a wise plan, I tell him. “Well, we’ll see,” he shrugs. SLT