Truck driver charged in deadly crash injuring Tracy Morgan on NJ Turnpike

[leroys73]

Thank you Amroad 17. 

[hbelkins]

If Wal-Mart had union drivers, there would be no way they would be travelling all those miles and all those hours.  I was an independent contractor and used to drive a 6-wheeler (I hate the term "box truck") all across the country.  Yes, there are times when my logbook would be "fudged", but maybe by two hours at the most.  There is no way I would, or could, drive 20 or more hours to bring supplies somewhere.

Saw elsewhere that the truck had electronic logging, and the driver had not worked extra, but had voluntarily and for personal reasons not gotten any sleep. The Walmart haters of the world can't blame this on the Walton empire. This one's strictly on the truck driver. For all we know he may have stayed up all night watching online pr0n.

[Crazy Volvo Guy]

Guys, take it from someone who's actually in the industry.  Walmart Transportation, LLC. and Walmart Stores, Inc. are two separate and very, very different companies.  They are affiliated, and both run from Bentonville, but are in fact separate and and they are run quite differently.

Nobody wants to work in a Walmart store or DC.  Walmart truck-driving jobs, however, are highly coveted in the industry, and they have a waiting list a mile long at any given DC.  A Walmart driving job is considered to be one of the best truck driving jobs you can get.  Walmart Transportation has one of the lowest driver turnover rates in the industry.  That speaks for itself.

Walmart tractors do indeed have electronic logs, on which driving time cannot be cheated.  And the dispatch will NOT push you to do what you say you can't do, contrary to popular belief.  For a week, in November of 2012, I actually ran as a Walmart contract driver.  They ran me hard, but never once did they try to push me to exceed my limits - despite the fact that I was on paper logs at the time, and seeing how I was only doing it temporarily, I could not communicate with them over the Qualcomm (so there would have been a "paper" trail) - it was all by phone.  My company is also the full-time contract carrier at three DCs (that I know of, although some rumors I've been hearing would suggest that we've picked up a couple more) and I have talked with several drivers who work on those fleets, they report the same - that they are not pushed around by Walmart's dispatch.

This is a case of a driver who simply did not speak up - for whatever reason - that he was not fit to drive that day.  I have to agree with H.B. that this one is squarely on the driver, not the company.

[Crazy Volvo Guy]

And as for the truck that was based in Georgia being in New Jersey:

Going back to my company being the contract carrier at several DCs, we have the North Platte, Nebraska DC.  It's not uncommon for the drivers on that account to go as far as Chicago, sometimes even farther.

[jeffandnicole]

Guys, take it from someone who's actually in the industry.  Walmart Transportation, LLC. and Walmart Stores, Inc. are two separate and very, very different companies.  They are affiliated, and both run from Bentonville, but are in fact separate and and they are run quite differently.

While Roper's (the truck driver) home address is in Georgia, his job was actually based out of Delaware.

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/06/11/kevin-roper-driver-charged-in-tracy-morgan-crash-due-in-court/

Accident investigators are looking into what role Roper's commute played in the fatal crash. NTSB spokeswoman Kelly Nantel said Roper lived in Georgia, but his job was based in Delaware.

[jeffandnicole]

This is a case of a driver who simply did not speak up - for whatever reason - that he was not fit to drive that day.  I have to agree with H.B. that this one is squarely on the driver, not the company.

Unfortunately, there is such hatred for Walmart by some people that facts don't matter.  Heck, in this one story posted in the Pacific thread, someone blamed the truck traffic on the highway as being Walmart traffic...even though the overwhelming majority of trucks have nothing to do with Walmart.

http://www.kcet.org/socal/departures/710-corridor/breathing-uneasy-living-along-the-710-freeway-corridor.html

"The communities have been bearing the brunt of industries that use the 710 as a Walmart super highway," (Angelo) Logan said. "They get to the shelves of Walmarts while the people see no benefit, and all they get is the negative impact."

[roadman65]

Guys, take it from someone who's actually in the industry.  Walmart Transportation, LLC. and Walmart Stores, Inc. are two separate and very, very different companies.  They are affiliated, and both run from Bentonville, but are in fact separate and and they are run quite differently.

Nobody wants to work in a Walmart store or DC.  Walmart truck-driving jobs, however, are highly coveted in the industry, and they have a waiting list a mile long at any given DC.  A Walmart driving job is considered to be one of the best truck driving jobs you can get.  Walmart Transportation has one of the lowest driver turnover rates in the industry.  That speaks for itself.

Walmart tractors do indeed have electronic logs, on which driving time cannot be cheated.  And the dispatch will NOT push you to do what you say you can't do, contrary to popular belief.  For a week, in November of 2012, I actually ran as a Walmart contract driver.  They ran me hard, but never once did they try to push me to exceed my limits - despite the fact that I was on paper logs at the time, and seeing how I was only doing it temporarily, I could not communicate with them over the Qualcomm (so there would have been a "paper" trail) - it was all by phone.  My company is also the full-time contract carrier at three DCs (that I know of, although some rumors I've been hearing would suggest that we've picked up a couple more) and I have talked with several drivers who work on those fleets, they report the same - that they are not pushed around by Walmart's dispatch.

This is a case of a driver who simply did not speak up - for whatever reason - that he was not fit to drive that day.  I have to agree with H.B. that this one is squarely on the driver, not the company.

Most of us think that they are synonymous anyway the way our minds think just in the same way we often stereotype groups.

[roadman]

This is a case of a driver who simply did not speak up - for whatever reason - that he was not fit to drive that day.  I have to agree with H.B. that this one is squarely on the driver, not the company.

The fact remains, he was employed by WalMart and was on the job when the crash happened.  This may not be a factor in the criminal trial against the trucker, but you can sure bet it will become an issue in the inevitable civil trial.

[roadman]

Preliminary information from the NTSB about the crash.  Interesting that the lane closure/construction zone was for overhead sign work.

http://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/fulltext/HWY14MH012_preliminary.html

[roadman65]

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/tracy-morgan-sues-walmart-deadly-718146 Tracy Morgan is taking action now against the retail giant.

[hbelkins]

^^^

Which is ridiculous. The driver had observed proper down times but had stayed up on his own. Walmart wasn't responsible for that wreck, the driver was individually.

[Scott5114]

A company is generally held to be responsible for the actions of its employees while they are acting as agents for the company, even if the employee's actions were insubordinate. To do otherwise is impracticable–say you go to McDonalds, slip and fall on an unmarked wet floor, incur $50,000 in medical bills, and sue. McDonalds says that they told Chris to put the sign out and he didn't. Should they really get out of it because of Chris's negligence? For one thing, even if you are win you are not going to get your $50,000 because Chris makes $7.25 an hour. Secondly, the company is responsible for verifying that its directives are being heeded by its employees (a manager should have checked to make sure the sign was put out).

I would expect Walmart's documented safety practices, and the admission by the employee, to limit damages paid by Walmart, and I am not a lawyer, but I would suspect that Walmart is still liable.

[hbelkins]

So I guess Walmart has to put a camera in the sleeper area of every truck it has to ensure that the driver is actually asleep instead of surfing pr0n sites or whatever the driver did instead of sleeping that night?

[Scott5114]

The problem here is you're expecting legal liability to be fair. It isn't.

Someone slams on their brakes for no reason, I rear-end them, I am liable, even though the car in front of me caused the accident. It sucks but that is how it is.

You could argue this should be "fixed", but any "fix" is going to cause problems of its own (if minimum-wage Chris has to pay, the injured party will never see the money).

[Pete from Boston]

My problem here is that my brain wants to conflate Tracy Morgan and Tracy Jordan, so I expect a lawsuit not only against Wal-Mart, but also against various celebrities, zoo animals, Burger King, a fifth-grade teacher, and Kabletown. 

[leroys73]

Follow the money.
Wally World has very deep pockets.

[roadman]

NTSB report on crash - http://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/AccidentReports/Reports/HAR1502.pdf