Feedback
I 'm a veteran of more than 50 years in the trucking business, with 40 of those years spent as an owner-operator. Since I retired about two years ago, I have been testing the new 2010 Detroit Diesel with this diesel fluid tank, as you call it. We call it urea. Though it is not classified as a hazardous material by the DOT and your source, Mr. Jim Spooner of Colonial Chemicals in New Jersey, says it is safe and inexpensive, you do a disservice to us all by not get-ting the facts right and taking one source as your proof. The Material Safety Data Sheet provides the following guidelines for what to do if you come into contact with urea: Move to fresh air if in-haled and provide artificial respira-tion if needed; wash skin with soap and water, and if there is a rash con-tact physician right away; flush eyes immediately with water for 15 min-utes. If it catches fire, it will burn a strong ammonia smell (carbon di-oxide or carbon monoxide) avoid breathing the fumes. Wear person-al protective equipment, wear safe-ty glasses and rubber gloves and use in a well-ventilated area. Toxic in-halation may cause respiratory tract problems, and it can be irritating to the eyes. I personally had some of this stuff blow out of the plastic tank and onto the hot muffler, and the smell was so bad I began to stop breath-ing. I had to get out of the truck immediately the odor of ammo-nia was so strong. When filling the urea tanks if they spill over it must be cleaned up immediately or fluffy white foamy residue will form on the tanks, and you must wear safety glasses, rubber gloves and clothing protection when you fill up these tanks. I know; I have been doing this for two years, and it is not as safe as you want truckers to believe. So with all due respect, get your facts straight and retract what you said in , or at least check it out and print a follow-up. I will be looking for it. Many truckers are going to get sick, hurt or maybe even die if they are not trained on how to use this prod-uct. I am trained, and it's not as easy as you try to make it out to be. It can be very dangerous even though DOT has not classified it as a hazmat product. Rob Williams Gresham, Ore. EDITOR GETS IT RIGHT I wanted to thank you for the bal-ance you struck in your article en-titled Historically Speaking. You presented well the problems with deficit spending by the government and why the market correction would happen much easier if the government would get out of the way and stop trying to help. Government doesn't seem to have learned from history and seems poised to make the same interven-tionist mistakes that prolonged the Great Depression. The worst idea right now is printing more money and spending ourselves into oblivi-on. However, as long as we have peo-ple in power who are not listening to sound advice or common sense, we will suffer under their choices for handling the economy. We must all make our voices heard to our representatives to try and stop this reckless spending. Robert C. Cox Waite Park, Minn. HELP OUR VETS I am a Navy veteran and former OTR driver and operations manager. Many of your readers are veterans, and we need help getting the word out about what we are trying to do to help our homeless veterans. There are an estimated 500,000-840,000 homeless vets. They proudly served their country in a branch of our Urea Not as Safe as Advertised WHERE IS THE WORST PLACE (STATE, REGION, ETC.) TO PARK IN THE U.S., AND WHY? Via Facebook: Connecticut! Rude people (I live there), tiny truckstops and there is always high traffic and fuel prices. Padraic S. All of New England. They lack truckstops. I don't know of one Flying J or Petro up there. The last TA is in NH on 95 just before getting into Maine. I hear zoning laws don't allow any truckstops in New England. Duane H. Via Twitter: Baltimore and that whole region. Not enough truckstops for the traffic through there. @TXviper I think the worst region to park is the DC region and California. @drivergeoff I think most of the East Coast from what I have heard, mainly New York (City), New Jersey and Virginia. @zionxpress My least favorite was North Louisiana just outside of Texas. Another is south of Yuma [Arizona]. @LoneStarTrailer Worst: Long Beach, CA. Deliver there every week, no parking. Can't idle, and I have no TriPac. @suzytrucker FEEDBACK JUNE 2009 10 TRUCKERS NEWS