Ontario has been seeing its share of wheel-less wonders on its roads over the recent past. A rash of wheel separation incidents has put the road safety spotlight squarely on truck drivers and carriers.
There were two cases on the same morning up in Northern Ontario. In another instance, a smoking tire led police to the culprit.
A typical commercial truck or semi-trailer tire weighs between 45 and 54 kg (about 100 and 120 lb.)
When combined with a standard steel or aluminum wheel, the total weight for a wheel assembly usually ranges from 56 to 79 kg (125 to 175 lb.)
An approximately 80-kg wheel separating at highway speed carries roughly 31 kilojoules of energy. That’s enough to smash through a windshield, collapse a roofline, or cause catastrophic front-end damage to a passenger vehicle.
On a secondary or tertiary road, a slower-moving truck’s loose wheel could still end up killing a pedestrian or two who is minding their own business on a sidewalk.
In some instances, eagle-eyed police officers have pulled drivers over, while in others, vigilant members of the public have reported these dangerous vehicles to the authorities.
Pay attention to the vehicle
Wheel separations are rare, but when they do occur, the damage can be catastrophic.
Truck driving trainers and experienced professional drivers keep telling students and rookies that they must learn to feel their vehicle. Pay attention to the signs traveling through your fingers as you hold the steering wheel. Listen to the sounds of your rig. Keep your head on a swivel and watch your trailer in your mirrors. The more in tune you are with your vehicle, the safer you are on the road.
And most truck drivers do this. As a professional, you learn how your big rig behaves and when things are not normal.
Bad choices
What bewilders me is when a wheel separation occurs and a driver chooses to carry on down the road.
Did they not feel, hear, or see it become detached? Were they on the phone or had the radio playing too loudly?
What was going on in their mind? Is it that 17 wheels or less will still help them make it to the next truck stop or rest area, or worse, to their destination?
Or could it be a dispatcher badgering them to keep moving, telling them to get it fixed later, in order to make a tight delivery window? Under such pressure, a driver must learn to say no, but sometimes they don’t.
Hauling a compromised rig
No one would want to experience a commercial vehicle wheel flying at them, not even the drivers themselves. Parking the rig by the side of the road and waiting for the police would be the way to go.
But choosing to carry on with a major defect is plain stupid. They are now hauling a compromised rig weighing thousands of pounds. Additional wheels can come off, or the tractor-trailer could swerve into the path of other vehicles.
Law enforcement agencies issue news releases after such incidents. They usually provide the age, hometown, company location, and charges laid against the truck driver and carrier.
Put them out of business
Now, if a driver takes off after losing a wheel or two, I sure would like to know who they are. Those drivers should be on a no-drive list. Also, if the company is charged, make its name public too. Customers are not likely to do business with them. The trucking community is pretty close-knit and word gets around quickly.
Protecting privacy is important, but sometimes the public interest is greater. We should not be mollycoddling folks who don’t care about the safety of other road users.
I propose naming and shaming them. Put them out of business. Good riddance!
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