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Tuesday, Sept. 10, 2002 - 6:05 p.m. So now we�re officially under Code Orange . That�s just great. What does this code mean, according to the geeks at Homeland Security.gov? ORANGE: High risk of terrorist attacks. --Coordinate necessary security efforts with armed forces or law enforcement agencies. --Take additional precaution at public events. --Prepare to work at an alternate site or with a dispersed work force. --Restrict access to essential personnel only Oh yeah, just what we need to hear right now: High risk of terrorist attacks. Like we haven�t been living with these thoughts enough lately, with all the networks falling over each other with their �9/11 Remembered� specials and such. The Vice Pres is even in hiding, supposedly to protect us from loosing both he and the Pres from an attack when they are in the same place. I sure hope they have a defibrillator nearby for Mr. Cheney���� A State striping crew was operating in our area today. These guys come from the headquarters in London, and they do all 13 counties in our district. That makes more sense than sending out people from each county with cans of upside-down marking paint and having them re-stripe the lanes, doesn�t it? Anyway, back to being serious here� The crew consists of a front blocking truck, the paining truck, a truck hauling the extra paint, and two attenuator trucks to block the painters from traffic. Why, you might be wondering, am I wasting your time explaining this job to you? The driver of the furthest �back attenuator truck was hit from behind by an 18-wheeler today. It happened at lunchtime. There were all the usual suspects in the break room with me. As we were discussing the sale prices at Rural King, we heard one of the drivers of the paint crew calling the storage for the county east of us, saying �Blank storage from Tr20-Emergency!�. He did this twice without Blank storage responding, so I ran down the hallway and called him on the radio to ask if I could help. He said that the attenuator truck had been hit at high speeds, both vehicles were badly damaged, and he couldn�t tell if anyone was hurt. He asked me to send them some help, and told me he would be away from his radio. Yikes! I had no idea how bad this might be, so I called the state police headquarters emergency line. They said they would send troupers to the scene, but that I needed to contact Blank county�s emergency response units. The dispatcher then hung up on me. Great! I had no idea how to contact Blank county emergency response, except for calling 911. Before I could do that, the phone rang. It was the #2 lead worker from Blank county. He wanted to let me know that they had heard my conversation with the painting crew, and that he let me handle the radio while he called the rescue squad (since it was his local unit). After that, all we could do was wait to find out what the damage was to the drivers and vehicles. Our Engineer was at the scene in minutes, and he let us know that nobody had any serious injuries. Maybe a few bumps and bruises, but nothing major. The vehicles are another story. Our attenuator is, of course, destroyed. That is what they are supposed to do when hit by another vehicle. They collapse, absorbing the impact from both vehicles. Our truck had some rear-end damage, and they had to tow it to the Blank storage. The Semi had major front axle damage, and it was also towed to a local garage. In case you are wondering just what an attenuator is, here is a photo of three of ours that I posted here last fall:
These trucks are a pain in the ass to drive (very back heavy), make every job have two extra employees on it (to drive the trucks with the attenuators), and cost a bunch of money to replace when they are hit. But , in the past several years (since the State made them mandatory on many jobs) these beasts have saved countless lives and many serious injuries in our department of transportation. I am not sure how much they cost (around $10,000 each, I think is about right), but they are worth every penny�.. Tomorrow is�.well, you know what tomorrow is here in America. I don�t plan on watching the orgy of coverage on the events of last 9/11. If anything new happens (see �Code Orange� above) , I�m sure I will find out about it from somebody. It�s not that I want to ignore the past. I know what happened then, and it still makes me both angry and sick to think about it. But I also don�t believe in picking off scabs. Let the wounds heal. And don�t ever forget what happened that day��.. I think I will post music reviews here tomorrow. Just for something besides 9/11 coverage��� If you stopped by here anytime in the last hour, my entry was a garbled mess. I may someday learn how to write HTML, but for now I still screw things up sometimes....
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