Truck drivers see a lot of strange things out on the road. They meet the weirdest people, see the most unusual sights, and are witness to some of the deadliest accidents out there. What they've seen can not be unseen.
He Saw The Other Driver Throw Something In Front Of His Tires…
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“A friend’s brother was a trucker and he had a car drive up next to him and throw a pillow case in front of his truck. Thinking there might be something in it that would pop his tires (apparently, this happens somewhat regularly), he avoided it and pulled over to remove it from the road so it wouldn’t cause any accidents. Turns out, it was full of kittens. All of them survived and he actually kept a kitten and it became his travel buddy for the remainder of his trucking career.”
It Wasn’t His Fault, But That Night Will Always Haunt Him
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“I used to work with an ex-trucker who once had a woman kill herself by jumping in front of his truck. She had left a suicide note in her house and she had a history of depression. The family didn’t want to sue or anything, they said they felt terrible for him that she chose to go that way and didn’t want to put him through anything more. They actually said they were glad she was no longer in pain. He hasn’t driven since and now spends his time working with troubled people as he was never quite the same after that happened.”
She Forced Her Way Inside The Truck
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“I’m a truck driver. I had a working girl, better known as a lot lizard, climb into my truck while I was sleeping. My truck’s passenger side door wasn’t locked as well as I thought. I’d been hit in a parking lot by another truck and it bent the door in a little. I had tested the lock and it seemed to lock and unlock fine, but that turned out to be wrong. It was around 1 am and in my sleep, I sort of vaguely heard my door open, so I was already starting to wake up, then someone shook me by the shoulder. I jumped up and hit her in the face with my laptop, we got in this weird hair pulling, slap fight, and I physically pushed/kicked her over the passenger’s seat and out the door onto the pavement. I stood there half awake blinking at her through the windshield when she jumped up, flashed me her boobs, flipped me off, and ran away. Then I went back to sleep.
I woke up an hour or so later with someone knocking on my door. It was the police. She called them and told them she was my girlfriend and I’d beat her up and thrown her out at a truck stop. I believe they were getting ready to handcuff me when a few drivers from other trucks came over to explain she’d been knocking on truck doors all night and was there most weekends, either knocking on doors or trying to climb into unlocked trucks. The cops didn’t really say anything else to me, they just handcuffed her and drove away with her in the back.
Plot twist: I’m female and I look nothing like the stereotypical ideal of the manly female trucker. She looked like a greasy beach ball with dead caterpillars for eyebrows.
Also, I’ve been flashed innumerable times by men and women. I’ve seen a lot of wrecks and the bodies. I had someone throw a football from an overpass and bust my windshield once. I helped drag another truck driver out of his truck through his windshield after I watched it run off the road and catch fire. I watched a guy hit a bison once and the truck and bison sort of exploded everywhere. I got stuck in the snow once and a whole Amish family came out and pulled me out with horses, then they gave me tons of food to take with me because the women said I was ‘too skinny.’ I knew a guy that had a pet goat, monkey, and parrot all in the same truck — too much weirdness.”
The Tale Of The Monkey Versus The Rottweiler
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“As a man that has reached the ripe old age of 48, I can promise you, I have seen some crap go down. This one totally takes the cake for me, though.
I was waiting out front of a truck stop back in the mid-’80s sitting on a park bench with a guy that had a big Rottweiler on a leash with him. I tried to make small talk, but he was quite a sourpuss, so we sat in silence for a few minutes until the most unexpected thing I have ever seen happened right before my very eyes.
While we were sitting there, a big 18-wheeler pulled in without a trailer so he parked right up front like a normal car would. Inside the cab of the truck with the driver was a little monkey, the dance for the organ grinder kind. The dog spotted this little monkey and went nuts over it, lunging at the end of his leash and barking at the top of his lungs, generally making a real spectacle of himself, to say the least.
The driver was obviously upset, but not nearly as much as the monkey was. Actually, upset may be the wrong adjective to use for the monkey, though. In retrospect, I think eagerly aggressive may be a more appropriate description for his disposition. He was pacing the dashboard back and forth, never taking his eyes off of this very aggravating dog.
The driver opened his little triangle window that they don’t make on cars anymore, the ones made for smokers back in the day. He yelled out to this jerk to call his dog off because it was upsetting his monkey. The guy laughed and said no way, said that his dog ain’t bothering nobody. The dog hadn’t shut up since he laid eyes on the monkey, so I promise you, he was bothering everybody for several blocks around.
Now here’s where things started to get interesting. The driver said that if he doesn’t call his dog off, he was gonna let his monkey loose on that dog. The jerk laughed and said that his dog would eat that monkey alive. Upon hearing this, the driver leaned over and reached into his glove box and pulled out one of those tiny baseball bats like you used to get at Astroworld or carnivals, and placed it in the monkey’s hand.
The monkey obviously knew what was about to go down because he was now trying to squeeze out of that little triangular window I mentioned earlier. This monkey had murder in his eyes if I have ever seen it. Driver hollered, ‘Last chance to save your dog, man.’ In response, the jerk let his dog off of the leash. Now we have a situation that has escalated to the point where we have a dog jumping up at the window and a monkey screaming profanities right back at him. Well, the driver finally rolled down the regular window and out leapt all kinds of miniature primate insanity, the dog never knew what hit him. Quick as a flash, this monkey was riding on the back of this dog’s neck with his two back feet all wrapped up in his neck fur with one hand hanging onto an ear. The other hand, as you may have guessed by now, was steadily and mercilessly raining down blows about this dog’s head and face and I mean hard blows. You could hear them: whap whap whap!
It only took a moment for the dog to realize he was in way over his head. He bolted, yelping bloody murder as he ran away at full speed, I mean this dog was running so frickin’ hard he was throwing up tufts of grass and dirt as soon as he left the pavement. The monkey was still riding him and beating on him the whole time. Jerk started acting like he wanted to fight the truck driver now, but several people, including myself, stepped in to stop that nonsense. After a couple of minutes or so, the little monkey came loping back with his little bat still in hand and leapt up into the still open window of the truck to await his master who had gone on into the store.
Never again in this lifetime will I see something so totally crazy and unexpected like that. I am both fortunate and humble to have been so privileged to be present for such an event.”
The Guilt Of What Had Happened Almost Drove Him To Kill Himself
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“My dad was a career long-haul driver. The thing he said was the worst he’s ever seen was when he was driving along some interstate and saw a minivan cut off the big rig truck in front of him. It’s been a few years since I heard the actual story, but I think the minivan ended up losing control, either due to weather or highway hypnosis. The big rig in front of my dad ended up hitting them and killed the entire family in the minivan and it was BAD. I mean, it was all splashed out across the freeway.
My dad had to physically restrain the other driver because, after the shock set in, he kept trying to run into traffic and kill himself.”
He Looked In The RV Expecting An Old Couple, But Saw Something Else Instead
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“Had an RV crawl up alongside me once in Indiana. I have a habit of looking over when folks get up along side me to check and see if they are paying attention to the road or their phone or dozing off. Anyway, I glance over to see how old this couple in this RV were and I was surprised to find the driver was maybe 30, tops. He looks over and smiles and as sure as God’s got sandals the next second later a young, naked woman is bent over the passenger side of the dash and is being, um, acted upon by another young naked woman with what appears to be a horse shaped and sized adult toy. Having seen this sort of scene before, I clicked the cruise back a notch or two and let them go on about their business.
Another time I was in deep south Texas, coming out of Laredo. A Mexican truck (you can spot one easy when you know what to look for) starts coming up alongside me. He gets up next to me and no one is at the wheel. I see two straps on the wheel and can only assume the dude was attempting to drive from the sleeper with a set of reins. I backed way off and let them get on up ahead of me. Saw them (three of these clowns from one truck) later at the border check on 35 in cuffs.
Then once I was running on Kansas highway 96 out of Great Bend early one morning, dawn was just peeking over the horizon back to the east. I rounded the curve out of town heading west when I see Bambi and the gang crossing the road, must have about 12 or more of them. I get up in the middle of the road and lay on the air horn. They stop crossing, but they all start running along on both side of the road in the direction I’m going. I get back on the throttle and just as I come up on the group, I see two of the deer on the north side deciding they now want to join the group on the south side. Reflexes kicked in and I jumped into the oncoming lane to avoid them. I saw one’s face clear as day as my fender and door went past him. He didn’t hit the front corner of my trailer or my drives, however, he did hit his head on the side of my trailer. It must have been enough to daze him as I watch him fall and get hit by my back hopper on the side. He went under my trailer tandems, where he exploded. I pulled over about a mile up the road where it was wide enough to do so and went to look over my trailer. I didn’t see any marks yet the only thing left was a tuft of fur or two and blood dripping off both mudflaps. RIP Bambi.”
When He Heard The Laugh, He Knew He Was Dealing With Something…Dangerous
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“I was driving for Costco a few years back. We usually took extra toy shipments to various locations due to the holiday season. We got a call that one of our locations in rural Kentucky needed to restock their giant Spiderman dolls. They knew I was a fast driver, so I was given the last minute late night duty. I loaded my truck and headed out on the 265. It was around 3 am when I started getting this eery feeling. I chalked it up to just being tired and popped a couple of no-doze. About 15 minutes later, the road started to fog up, I mean more so than any other time before or since. It got to the point where I had to pull off to the side and wait. There weren’t any other cars on the road and I was ahead of time, so I figured I could wait until it cleared up a bit. After about five minutes of sitting in silence, my truck went dead. No lights, no engine, nothing. I tried to crank it, but it was like the battery was dead. I tried my radio, but couldn’t get anyone on. I checked my cell phone and there was no signal. As I was sitting there, contemplating my next move, I heard what sounded like a child crying. It slowly morphed into a woman crying, or at least that what it sounded like to me. Now, I’m a big man, 6’3, 250 pounds, but I refused to exit my cab. I did roll down my window and asked if anybody needed help. At that point, the crying stopped. Then I heard what sounded like a sinister laugh. At that point, I felt like the laughter was directed at me. I rolled up my window and it seemed like the more scared I became, the louder the laugh was. Then as soon as it started it stopped. And just like that, my truck started back up and the fog dissipated. I drove out of there like a bat out of Hell. I got to the next truck stop and pulled in. I ran to the bathroom and poured water on my face and asked my reflection, ‘Did that really just happen?'”
When The Doors Opened, The Real Show Began
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“I was in California, it was my second year trucking so it must have been 2004. The guy I was driving with was old school and was teaching me the ropes. We pulled into a truck stop to get some rest. At about 2:30 am, he woke me up and said, ‘You’ve got to see this!’ There was a big commotion going on out in the lot and police were starting to show up. All of that activity was centered around one truck. Eventually, its locks were cut and the doors to the trailer flew open and out came about 500 starving, scared immigrants that had been smuggled in. It reminded me of cats scattering like you see in the hoarder shows. What came next may have been the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. I doubt the cops ever caught them all because a lot ran straight for the woods, but some would come back and open doors for their friends who had been captured. To watch the police chase these people around in circles, then to see their face when they would bring their new catch to the holding van just to see the doors wide open and empty was hilarious!”
The Car Had Flipped Over, But They Never Did Find The Driver…
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“Oh man, the things I’ve seen…
-Lots of fire. I’ve probably personally saved people loads in damages just from calling 911. The craziest was this one time I was almost home. The sun was just barely down and I saw a truck headed the other way with something bright coming from the back of it. There was a constant line of sparks, 4 feet high, flying from his back right tire. I’d never seen so many sparks, as if he was doing it on purpose. As he passed me, I could see that the sparks were now a solid wall of fire, several hundred feet long and about three feet high. I called 911 that second and told them to hurry because that fire had a head start. Saw it three days later, they got there in time before it reached the highway.
-I’ve had to literally dodge other cars. Sometimes people make mistakes, or get enraged, or maybe are on something, but I’ve had cars both unintentionally and intentionally try to hit me on the highway. You want an adrenaline rush, experience that. When you’re trucking, you’re controlling something so powerful that you hold the lives of everyone around you. Can you imagine a 26 thousand pound truck hitting a 3 thousand pound car? I’m sure I’ve saved people’s lives by keeping track of the big picture and dodging other cars in HEAVY traffic. Still scars me thinking about those times when I’ve been a fraction of a second from a national-news worthy wreck.
-One homeless man chasing another in a dead sprint.
-I’ve had a guy on a motorcycle next to me practicing his wheelie for two minutes! Talk about nerve-racking. Really cool to watch, though.
-Once found a rolled car ON the highway at 3 am. A few people were already there standing around it, and I asked them what was going on and offered my help. They said they had no clue, they had just seen the car blocking one lane and pulled over. The worst part was that we didn’t see anyone associated with the car. We wanted to believe that they had fled the scene, but we were afraid that they might have been flung a couple hundred feet away somewhere out in the tall grass where we couldn’t see. Never found out about that one.
-I occasionally pick up hitchhikers. Very interesting people. You want to have an interesting day? Find a hitchhiker. I usually do it when it’s cold out (I can’t stand the cold) and I’ve got enough room to pull over safely within a quarter mile of the guy. Most of them are very poor, but for different reasons. Some are on an adventure, some are on a mission, but some of these guys, as you’ve heard, are crazy. I met one guy who seemed to have half a dozen mental disorders (I have a degree in psychology) and I started to fear for my life. This guy told me I wouldn’t believe him, but he was the leader of a secret Aryan group that has 20 leaders that all ESP to each other (like telepathy). He would try to explain by telling me to look at the next sign on the road, and then say, ‘Mmm…mmm…yeah, you see? No? The next one, the next one you’ll see!’ I thought he really might try to kill me, and I admit I was afraid. I can’t try to fight somebody while I’m driving a truck on the highway.”
He Did Try To Warn Him…
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“My dad’s a trucker. One night, my dad was driving about a mile behind a guy he knew. He got on his radio and told the guy to be careful around the curve, it was really sharp and had a blind bend. He got back a, ‘Yeah, alright.’
When he got to the curve, the other guy’s semi was in the ditch. My dad got to the straight away, parked, and rushed back to help the guy. When he got back to the scene, the steering wheel was through the guy’s chest and his insides were everywhere.”
Truckers Are Witnesses To Accidents No One Else Could See
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“When police put up tarps alongside accidents, all too often we truckers can see over them. I wish they would use taller tarps. I always made sure not to look, but every once in awhile you would see lots of blood or a stretcher with a sheet drawn over a body. Once, it was only a small lump under that sheet. I tell myself it was probably someone’s leg as that seems a better plausible alternative.
But really, every day was a countdown to a WTF moment. Pushy lot lizards (working women who single out truckers), a few crooked cops, my dispatcher sending me to the wrong state, or the constant flow of cars trying to kill you. Loved the machines but screw that job.
I almost forgot. There was that time my boss had me delivering fish through a forest fire with a leaking reefer tank to West Point. Ah, to be young and fearing you will never find another job.”
He Was Driving Way To Fast For Those Conditions
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“My dad was driving down some interstate when it started raining really bad. He couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of him, so he pulled off somewhere and waited for the rain to pass. While he was waiting, he saw a sports car drive by, followed not too far behind by a dump truck going way too fast for a large truck in those conditions. Finally, the rain passed, so he kept going. A few miles up the road, he came upon a massive wreck. Apparently, the dump truck had slammed right into the back of the sports car full of four college kids that were coming back from Spring Break.
My dad went to see if anyone was injured and it was gruesome. The two guys in the back died instantly, the driver died on the way to hospital, and the guy in the passenger seat survived but he had to have both his legs amputated because they had been crushed by the dashboard. The dump truck driver survived with pretty much no injuries. A state trooper showed up and saw the wreckage. He went up to the dump truck driver and punched him in the face. None of the other drivers said anything.”
He Felt A Ghostly Presence Touch His Shoulder
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“This story is from my grandpa. He’s a retired long-distance truck driver and he often drove throughout the night and early hours of the morning over unfamiliar roads. This one particular day it was between 2 am and 3 am and he was driving down a twisting country road that was so narrow only one vehicle could fit at a time, so if two vehicles met from different directions, one would have to pull off the road to let the other pass.
The road was empty save for my grandpa. On the right side of the road there was thick woodland, and on the left open fields and a lake. There were no street lights, the only light came from my grandpa’s truck and the moon. It was pretty lonely.
My grandad was going steady down the road going a bit faster than he should (when my grandpa said this, I always took it to mean he was blazing down the road as fast as the truck could go), listening to the radio and probably not paying much attention when he suddenly felt hands on his shoulders and a voice whisper his name in his ear so close that he felt the breath on his skin.
He recognized the voice – it belonged to his mother who had passed away a few years previously. Naturally, this spooked my grandpa and he instinctively hit the brakes. Seconds later, his headlights lit up a pile of three crashed cars that took up the entire road. My grandpa stopped just short of the wreckage, but if he hadn’t braked when he did, he would’ve plowed straight into the cars.
The occupants in the crashed cars were all severely injured and my grandpa was able to get emergency help. Had he joined the pileup, it probably would’ve meant a more dire outcome for all of them.
There’s a number of explanations for what my grandpa heard and felt, but my grandpa truly believes it was his mother giving him a warning.”
The Power Lines Were Much Lower Than They Thought
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“My brother-in-law was a trucker for many years. He took his stepson (my sister’s son) with him on one run. They were somewhere in the rural South and hit a power/telephone line that was too low across the road. It seems hard to believe, but the collision actually yanked one of the telephone poles out of the ground and it crashed through the passenger window and out the windshield and stuck there. Neither of them were seriously hurt, my nephew just got a few minor scratches from flying glass.”