When the open road turns into an unsolved puzzle, it weighs heavy on our hearts, and today's Rollin' 18 episode is no exception. We first address the enigma wrapped in sorrow—the case of David Schultz, a fellow trucker whose recent and mysterious passing leaves a void in the fabric of our close-knit community. Then, shifting gears with a heavy heart, I'll recount an unsettling episode of road rage from Louisiana to serve as a sobering reminder of the volatility that can spark from the simplest of things—an unnecessary horn blast, a thoughtless lane change.
Amidst the personal tales and industry tribulations, we also tackle the lofty proposals coming from the White House, scrutinizing the $1.5 billion dream of a zero emissions freight sector. It's a discussion that cuts deep into the heart of what it means to be a trucker today, balancing the rigors of the road with the daunting shadows of tomorrow's environmental expectations. Wrapping up, I send out a truckload of gratitude to you, our dedicated listeners. Your commitment fuels my drive to bring you the stories, advice, and camaraderie that form the bedrock of our Rollin' 18 community, with fresh episodes to accompany you on your journeys every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Keep your eyes on the horizon and your spirits high, truckers. We're in this together.
Text me anytime with news, suggestions, and stories at (641) 990-5641. God bless, be safe, and keep it between the lines drivers.
When the open road turns into an unsolved puzzle, it weighs heavy on our hearts, and today's Rollin' 18 episode is no exception. We first address the enigma wrapped in sorrow—the case of David Schultz, a fellow trucker whose recent and mysterious passing leaves a void in the fabric of our close-knit community. Then, shifting gears with a heavy heart, I'll recount an unsettling episode of road rage from Louisiana to serve as a sobering reminder of the volatility that can spark from the simplest of things—an unnecessary horn blast, a thoughtless lane change.
Amidst the personal tales and industry tribulations, we also tackle the lofty proposals coming from the White House, scrutinizing the $1.5 billion dream of a zero emissions freight sector. It's a discussion that cuts deep into the heart of what it means to be a trucker today, balancing the rigors of the road with the daunting shadows of tomorrow's environmental expectations. Wrapping up, I send out a truckload of gratitude to you, our dedicated listeners. Your commitment fuels my drive to bring you the stories, advice, and camaraderie that form the bedrock of our Rollin' 18 community, with fresh episodes to accompany you on your journeys every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Keep your eyes on the horizon and your spirits high, truckers. We're in this together.
Text me anytime with news, suggestions, and stories at (641) 990-5641. God bless, be safe, and keep it between the lines drivers.
Speaker 1:
Hello drivers, welcome to Rollin' 18 Podcast. I'm your host, walter Gannon. Before we get started with today's show, we have some new information about the body of that trucker missing since November here in Iowa and they say that they found no foul play suspected. Now the body of the missing trucker, david Schultz, is now at the Iowa Coroner's Office in Ankeny, iowa, and there's a lot of questions. In fact there's more questions than answers when it comes to this case. You can go to the Trucker News and read the article there. It's truckernewscom. They have the latest update on the body of Trucker missing since last November. His body was found April 24th in the Iowa farm field. We're going to keep you updated. We just sent an email to the coroner's office to keep us updated. The preliminary findings show no type of injuries to David Schultz, leading them to believe that it was not a violent crime. But they have yet to do get back toxicology, I guess you would call it and they've yet to get back certain things forensic evidence, things like that. So they're still working on it. We're going to hold judgment. We do have some drivers that went on there and made some statements about. You know, this whole thing stinks to high heaven. According to Todd Rodby he posted he didn't just wander a mile and a half from his truck and lay down in the middle of a field, he says. A whole lot of official answers we're getting are pretty damn sketchy, if you ask me. They searched over 100,000 acres when they found out he was missing. He was hauling live hogs over to a place. He was supposed to arrive that particular morning in November. Never showed up. They went, located his truck through GPS tracking, found his wallet, found his phone, found. You know, here it is months later and they find him a mile and a half by one person out in the field. And we've got a lot of questions because they searched over 100,000 acres, they used drones, never did find David. All of a sudden, one person finds him. We have questions and we're going to get answers. So we will keep you up to date on this missing trucker story, that is for sure. Any information we get back from the coroner's office we will definitely let you know.
Speaker 1:
I would like to remind you guys that road rage is a lot different these days than it was before in the past. People are pulling out guns and killing you. There was a trucker shot and killed on I-20 in Louisiana in a road rage incident. Now a truck driver was shot and killed Tuesday morning, april 23rd, in an apparent road rage incident. Morning, april 23rd, in an apparent road rage incident. The shooting occurred on Interstate 20 near US Highway 80 in Cato Parish, which is located in the northwest corner of Louisiana and on the state line with Texas. A statement with Cato Parish Sheriff's Office said the driver of an Acura SUV and the driver of his tractor trailer had some sort of verbal exchange and pulled over on exit three on a ramp in Greenwood. The trucker tried to run away but was followed and shot by the SUV driver.
Speaker 1:
Ladies and gentlemen, drivers out there, listen to me. It's not worth it anymore. People are going to pull out a gun and shoot you in the face and you're going to be dead. You're not even going to know it. So why risk your life? Don't get upset. We're the largest industry in the world. I think we can do a lot better and this guy, this driver here, could still be alive today had he not got mad and he went up against somebody with a gun. You don't know, people are crazy. Stay away from it. If you've got an attitude or you get pissed off, go beat up on a Bing bag or something. Stay away from crazy people, because you don't know who they are.
Speaker 1:
Now, the story I wanted to talk about today is I could be wrong, but it's important that we focus on what is happening today compared to what is going to happen in the future. I understand a lot of people think global warming is a big bad monster that's going to kill us all within the next few years. That's wrong. Science has proven that is wrong. We have time to do things the right way, but instead the White House just announced a $1.5 billion bill, or possibly an executive order, to create zero emissions freight sector. We don't have time for that. We have drivers and owner-operators and companies struggling right at this moment. Give that $1.5 billion to them. Give them some sort of relief, whether it be on diesel fuel, whether it be on raising the rates on certain freight. $1.5 billion could really help the trucking industry a lot, but these people want to continue to play politics and I'm getting tired of it.
Speaker 1:
President Joe Biden, on Wednesday, april 24th, announced a goal of creating a zero emissions freight sector in the US as part of efforts to reduce pollution and improve air quality. Do we not have enough companies right now that's dealing with battery-operated trucks. They're testing everything out. They're running smoothly, they're doing a good job on implementing certain things. They're moving it slowly, just like it should be. But it seems like Washington just wants to spend money, but on the wrong things. We're giving billions and billions, hundreds of billions of dollars to other countries to combat their problems and we're doing nothing for Americans, especially truckers. Today, the key to realizing it says that is the increased use of emissions free vehicles, and the plan announced by Biden includes $1.5 billion to accomplish that goal. Now Biden's goal calls for $1 billion from the Environmental Protection Agency for states, cities and tribes to replace Class 6 and Class 7 heavy-duty vehicles, including school buses, refuge collection trucks and delivery trucks, with emissions-free vehicles. So this is all city stuff.
Speaker 1:
These are servants that work for us. Our tax dollars pay them to do their job, but they get the best of everything. They get the newest equipment, they get the highest hourly rate, they get the best insurance life, dental, health and here we are the people that actually pay the bills, the ones that pay our taxes, the ones that struggle every single day in this country. We give that money to the bills, the ones that pay our taxes, the ones that struggle every single day in this country. We give that money to the government, trusting them to do the right thing, and they spend $10,000 on a toilet. It says here $400 million from the Department of Transportation to reduce air pollution caused by trucks at port facilities. I thought you had a no-idle policy at these port facilities. I don't understand that at all.
Speaker 1:
$72 million from the Department of Energy to create a super truck charged program to demonstrate how vehicle grid integration enables depots and truck stops to provide affordable, reliable charging while increasing grid resiliency. There is no affordable, reliable charging if you don't have the grid that can handle the capacity charging if you don't have the grid that can handle the capacity. We're testing the wheel before we test the car. Does that make any sense to anybody? You got to test the car. You got to make sure the car can handle the power before you do anything.
Speaker 1:
They're making excuses, ladies and gentlemen. They're spending billions of dollars on things we don't need at the moment. Instead of working back to front, they're working front to back. They're going to the top of an issue and they're working their way down, not knowing what they're going to find at the bottom. Let's work slowly, let's move forward, not backwards. And this is how Washington does things a lot and this is why they screw things up constantly, says here.
Speaker 1:
The new commitment to zero emissions freight aligns with and supports President Biden's existing goals for a carbon pollution-free energy sector by 2035. We all know that's not going to happen. That the results of all the investigations on that prove. You're going to need at least three times that amount of time to get anywhere close to where they want to be. The $1 billion in EPA funding will support infrastructure to charge fuel and maintain heavy-duty zero-emission vehicles.
Speaker 1:
Now, every time the government gets involved with this type of money, there is some corruption. You can almost bet a third of that is going to go for corruption. So that third is gone. Then another third is going to be wasted because they're not going to know exactly what they need to do with it. So they're going to end up with things they don't need or things they didn't have to build to begin with, and that's going to end up rotting and all that money is going to go bye-bye. To build to begin with, and that's going to end up rotting and all that money is going to go bye-bye, so you're left with another third that might actually do something, but not nearly what they thought it would.
Speaker 1:
And the government does this all the time with education, with transportation, building roads, designing different things that, oh, this will definitely help this. Then they find out later they're wrong. 20 years later they got to tear it down and redo it. Now the Department of Transportation's Reduction of Truck Emissions at Port Facilities grant program invest in port electrification and efficiency improvements. They solved that problem 20 years ago when they set up them portable air conditioning and heating ducts that you pull into a parking spot, you wait for your turn, you hook this thing into your window and it keeps you warm and cold. And they even had internet and everything. They installed those at a lot of truck stops across the country. It was working great, cut way down on emissions and then all of a sudden they disappeared. Why is that? Because people weren't using them. You had to pay to use it. The government gives the money for free, they build the stuff for free and then they charge you for it. This is how this works.
Speaker 1:
We really need to stop with the incompetence in Washington and, like I tell you drivers all the time, we are the largest industry in the world. If we were to get along let's say at least 80% of us would just get along we could own this country as far as the decisions that are made the poor decisions would be irrelevant because they would go away. We would make good decisions and we would have a much better life. But you guys refuse to do it. Just like the road rage thing. You know you get out there and you guys fight each other in the parking lots. You fight each other out in the roads. Almost 90% of you got something sarcastic to say on the CB Enough of the whining, can we all just be a grown adult here and start doing the right thing? Says here. When truckers spend hours idling at ports, it's bad for drivers, bad for supply chains and bad for nearby communities. We had that problem solved, ladies and gentlemen, 20 years ago. They screwed it up, they spent billions of dollars on it and then they trashed that program. I don't want to hear any more about that garbage Now.
Speaker 1:
I mentioned on one of last week's podcasts about predatory towing and we got some more good news, some follow-up on that, from another state, state of Tennessee. They are, I believe, going to pass a bill that says that truck stops are very limited on when they can use a boot on a driver's truck. So they're not going to have, they're not going to be able to just nilly-willy put a boot on your truck just because you owe five or ten bucks. This bill was passed for simple reasons and the main reason was that these truck stops were getting out of hand booting people's trucks, driver's trucks, for no reason and it was ridiculous and it would cost you a lot of money to get that boot off. And you just can't boot somebody's truck. Yes, that may be private property, but that is their private truck. Both parties have rights and you can't just walk up and boot a truck just because you feel like it. So kudos to Tennessee for doing that. Kudos for people starting to wake up and realize that truck drivers rights are being swallowed whole because they think they can just do whatever they want to a truck driver.
Speaker 1:
Look, I always know we have bad truck drivers out there, but the percentage is 10% or less. Always. It's always that way. The vast majority of you drivers out there are great people. You're going to do the right thing no matter what.
Speaker 1:
But it's real easy to get complacent and lazy and start doing things that you know isn't right, but you think, well, it's not that big of a deal it is. You're driving a semi, a 40-ton bullet. Don't take that for granted. Don't ever take it for granted. Always learn every single day about safety. Always learn every single day about your duty as a commercial driver, because at the end of the day, you want to get home safe, but at the end of the life, you want to be able to retire with something. You want to be able to retire with a great wage. And if you're going to sacrifice 90% of your home time for this job, you better make it worth it. You better have something to show for it by the time you get done. Otherwise, you're going to look back and say what the hell did I just do?
Speaker 1:
I'm Walter Gallin with Roland 18 Podcast. I appreciate you folks listening. We will see you next time. Thank you for listening to Roland 18 Podcast. Visit our website at wwwroland18podcastcom. Remember we have a new episode every Monday, wednesday and Friday. Be safe out there, drivers. We love all of you.