Whacky Van Driver Stories

Trains Magazine General Discussion
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Here, as promised is the wacky van driver stories thread. These stories are intended to be about amusing stories concerning contract van drivers. They are not intended to be mean spirited.

I’ll start with one of mine.

One night while I was still a Conductor Trainee I was called from the motel at our away terminal along with the rest of my crew consisting of an Engineer, Conductor and Engineer Trainee to run a westbound manifest. We arrived at the terminal and our train arrived shortly thereafter. To our dismay behind the leading GP40-2 was one other unit a BNSF B30-7A cabless unit. This meant a deadhead home for one of us as the GP40-2 has only 3 seats. A heated discussion ensued with our van driver, the only one based at Port Jervis.

Jerry was 40ish about 5’7" or so with a mop of blond hair, receding in the middle, sideburns and a pair of glasses that just screamed Classic Coke. He talked incessantly about nothing much.

It was decided that Jerry would drive me, the crew member with the least seniority to a meeting approximately half way to our home terminal Gang Mills (Corning) with another van. I would transfer to the other van for the balance of the deadhead. Before we depart, the crew pulls west and I hang and test the marker for them, then into the van I go for a strange trip into the Twilight Zone.

Jerry started by talking about various inane topics like the weather and I remember nodding off and waking up on a dark stretch of highway 17 and having Jerry notice that I was awake and say, “you know, there really are extra terrestrials here on earth right now…you agree with me, right?” So, here I was in the middle of a long drive through a lightly populated area with this guy who probably likes his headgear made of tinfoil…sheesh…

After a long discussion about outer space and UFOs to placate Jerry we arrived at the meeting place to find, surprise, no other van. So Jerry gets on the radio to call Bob the other driver f

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Sure, I’ll play.

Most everyone here has heard over their scanner “UP detector, mile post 513.4” or any number of other messages hot box detectors give out.

Well one evening, while deadheading to my AFHT (Away from home terminal) I was starring out the window watchin’ awhole lot of west Texas country side goin’ by, content to my thoughts about nothing in particular. Then the radio crackled to life announcing a west bound train going past the hotbox detector outside of Pecos, Tx. Now the old T&P mainline runs, literally, right next to IH-20. You can see the trains, tracks, bridges, everything on the mainline from the interstate, including the actual hot box detector “houses”. You know those little 5’x 4’ aluminum boxes with the little white light attached to them.

Well that sweet little ladies voice comes over the airwaves to anounce the usual " UP detector, milepost 653.4, No defects, UP detector, OUT", and then it happens, my limo driver hits me with “Hey Z, how do you get one of those jobs?”

Now (as some of you already know) I come from a railroading family and I’ve been doing this for a pretty good while myself, so I’m used to people asking me about getting jobs on the railroad, but I wasn’t quite sure as to what he was talking about. So I asked him “What job?” He in turn replied, “The one where you watch the train go by, like that woman that was just on the radio! How much does it pay?”

I turn around, because I can’t believe what I’m hearing, and I’m hoping my hogger is getting this, to find David (my hogger) has arisen from his “bed” in the backseat and is starring at the back of the driver’s head in disbelief! Now David is alway’s pulling gags on people (He and I once had a conductor trainee 'bout jump out the front of the engine at speed, but that’s another story!), so I know he’s gonna have a field day with this one!

We only had 20 miles left in our trip, but by the time we got to Toyah, Tx. (MP 666 No Doubt!!!) D

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This thread will be fun to watch. Hopefully, the regular railroaders who are forum members will participate…One thing railroaders can do well is spin yarns. And having seen some of the Rentzenberger van drivers that orbit around Parsons, there should be plenty of fodder for stories![(-D][swg]

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Good stories guys, keep em coming.

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I’m surprised we haven’t heard from Nora. Isn’t she a clerk who has ferrying crews as part of her job? Perhaps she could share some “Crew” horror stories with us. LC

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I got one…

A few years back we had a van driver leave on a run and never come back…no one could find him or the van.

A few weeks later the police called, and said they had one of our vans. Seized in drug raid. Turns out, the driver sold the van to get his fix.

So be wary of your van driver. [8D]

Nick

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Can’t tell you her name, because I never found out…

But she worked for the company whose name starts with a R…

Came into North Yard, looking for a UP crew, went to the wrong end of the yard, got in between two live switching leads, and panicked.

Backed up trying to turn around, with out looking, and got the rear bumper hung on a switch handle.

Threw the van in drive, dug a nice little trench, pulled the bumper half way off, then the switch handle gave out, and she shot across the open area between the leads, and ran head first into another switch stand.

Finally managed to get the van off of that one, tore the front fender to shreds, was totally lost and confused, decided to drive to the other end of the yard, directly down the middle of the yard, between the switching leads on the scooter path the car men use, just wide enough to fit the van in as long as no trains were on either track.

Got to the other end, discovered it wasn’t really a road, and there was no way to cross over the tracks down there, decided to back up the entire length of the yard.

Got back to the top end, and drove into the UP’s Basin yard, which is next to ours, turned into what she though was a road, but turned out it was a toe path…backed up again.

Came back to our yard, decided the road that wasn’t a road was her best bet, took off down it again, only to find a auto rack train headed down on the lead towards her from the other end…threw it in reverse, and tried to back up again, but luck was not watching over her today, another trai

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I haven’t driven a jitney in almost a year now (was an intermodal clerk for a number of months and now am training as a block operator). And I don’t have as many horror stories as you might expect, but I can come up with a couple. It’ll have to wait a bit, though, because first shift does not agree with me and I am TIRED. :slight_smile:

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Eddy, your story is the best but LC’s tinfoil hat driver is very good, too. We had a crew one night called for relief service. They were instructed to go to a passing track and wait. While waiting, the driver started telling the engineer and conductor that he knew what they were planning. The crew asked him, what do you mean? The driver replied, you guys are planning on killing me and stealing this van. Crew was about speechless at this as the driver went on and on about how they were out there in the dark and he (the driver) knew they were up to no good, they were going to kill him and steal the van but it wasn’t going to happen. The driver jumped out of the van and took off running but he left the keys. He walked somewhere to a telephone and called the local sheriffs’ department. After awhile, here came a patrol car who wanted to talk to the crew about plotting theft and murder. The deputy was well satisfied that there was nothing to it after talking to them and no one ever saw the driver again.

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Holy night! Some of these van drivers sound like some of our newbies .

We had one we named Bling ( he had tons of it on him) and he bragged about all his hot young women, he used to co own a strip club in my local area ( shut down cause it was a cat house)Guy was in his 50’s short ( think oompa loompa) No K-9 teeth on either top or bottom ( and nothing between them either) but he was Gods gift to women!

Had one in the yard stop too close to the 1 track ( right off the hump) and when the conductor tossed open the door WHAMO a box car got a door prize!

Then the one in Chicago that goes through the I-pass at 80 mph with his eyes closed cause the fruitloop is ASLEEP and admits it!!!Mind you you have a few inches either side in some of those.

But that being said there are a few good ones. One of our night guys always brings homemade cookies nightly!One of the best drivers too, always comes to get us and always safe.

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I’m enjoying the stories too. After holding in our hotel for 36 hours we got a call from the Crew DS at 0330 advising that we would be catching a deadhead to our home terminal. About an hour later the van arrived, driven by a middle aged blone woman known to crews as “Betty the Bomber”(Her name was in fact Beth, but like everyone associated with the railroad she got a nickname). Betty had kind of a thing for my older conductor and she was hitting on him hard from the first instant. The van we were riding was one of those Ratzenberger stretch specials with the three full rows of seats so I climbed into the back and settled in for a nap with my grip as a pillow. We got on the freeway and the last thing I remember before nodding off was Betty telling the conductor that she was tired from driving all day and that he would need to “hold her hand”. I chuckled to myself thinking that this was more of her come on and went to sleep. I wake up at the meal stop halfway for some reheated pizza and back to sleep. Although sleep in a van has no quality, it is better than nothing. My home at the time was a straight hour and a half from the terminal and I was pretty sure we’d be first out on our pool by the time I got home given our long layover in the away terminal. SUDDENLY, I was awakened by an airhorn RIGHT IN MY EAR!! I sat bolt upright in time to see the large yellow fender of a semi passing so close to me I could have reached out the window and slapped it. The van swerved throwing me to the other side and I grabbed the seat in front of me. We arrived in our home terminal a few minutes later without further mishap. Apparently, both of the people in the front seat had started to nod off… I never did have to ride with Betty again, can’t say I’m too sorry. I have occasional recurrent nightmares about yellow semis though… LC

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One story that didn’t happen to me but to another crew I run the rails with is sorta funny.

A crew was callled in pool service on the Kenova District to build and east bound empty train at an intermediate terminal.

Well it took most of the 11 hrs.59 mins. to build this train.And the crew really thought they would taxi home instead of taxiing all the way to the away from home terminal.To their and the taxi drivers suprise they are told to go east to the away terminal.

The crew and driver are pretty mad and discuss the matter between themselves.

In the end the crew had the driver convinced that the money the he made and the time that the job took just wasn’t worth it.So the driver told the men to get out of the van and they had better get ahold of someone,because he was going to drive the van to the taxi center and quit.And he did.

So the crew had to wait out on the highway,call the dispatcher up on the radio and wait until another van could come by and get them.

They did get to go home ,but only after waiting on the highway for an hour for the van to show up.

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Great stories so far reading them helps to pass time at the office. [(-D] Keep 'em comming!

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Once in a railyard long ago I got sorta wedged into a track switch.

Applied some torque and managed to get out of it. The horrible “Crunch” followed by the suddenly sloppy steering and combined with the strange looks from other drivers encouraged me to get out of my cab.

My front end had failed thanks to the frog. Both steers were facing outwards and made it impossible to use the rig. I have no one but myself to blame.

There are many vans, trucks and buses running around hauling our esteemed railroad crews here, there, yonder and never home. =)

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[:)][(-D][^] Keep 'em coming… great stories!

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Occasionally, you’ll get a driver who is new (at least, to the crew being hauled) who swears he knows exactly where he going, or he knows a shortcut that will get you there faster. Had a driver one time who insisted he knew exactly where we were going and despite all of us telling him that WASN’T where we were going, it was a town of the same name in the next state, he wouldn’t stop the van nor would he head the right way. We gave up and let him go. When we got to the town of the same name, he drove all around and finally asked us, “Where’s the railroad?”. Had a driver one time called to take us to our home terminal via a deadhead move after handling a train out of the terminal. This was before it was common to have radios in the vans. In the meantime, after tying the train down we were on, we received instructions to get on another train when it arrived. It was wintertime and we got into the van to stay warm and told the driver of the change in plans. He started to pull out and we asked him where he thought he was going. He told us he was taking us to our home terminal, that’s what he was called to do and he was doing it. We got him stopped and told him we weren’t getting into trouble because he was deprived of the trip, that we’d be in serious trouble. We had a rather heated discussion over that.

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Huh.

Driver has one set of orders, the transported crew has another set.

Sounds to me the official voice of dispatch did not throw the stone slabs down to the ballast for everyone to do one mission.

If that was me I probably will go with the crew’s they are the ones who need to go not me.

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Sounds more like their dispatcher and the RR dispatcher had a miscommunication.

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No, there wasn’t miscommunication between the railroad dispatcher and the van dispatcher, there wasn’t even a railroad in the town he took us to, we told him town and state, he took us to a town of the same name in the neighboring state (in a county bordering the state we needed to be in). After awhile, arguing with him was pointless, this was before anyone had a cellphone, the only radio was a handset the conductor had, out of range, no way to key up the dispatcher, we weren’t on the Interstate, it was late at night. He wouldn’t listen, so we gave up and let him go. We did eventually get to the right town in the right state.

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This reminds me of one time when I was working for Renzenberger…they called me up with a trip and told me I would be going to “Enon, Ohio.” I had never heard of Enon, OH, but there is an Enon Valley, PA, about 20 miles from Conway; the railroad does go through there, it’s known as Enon, and it is literally about two miles from Ohio. I asked if she was sure she meant Enon, OH and not PA and she said what she had was Ohio. I looked Enon, OH up on a map and it was somewhere out near Dayton, which was not an area I normally went to.

I was about 99% sure that I was really supposed to be going to Enon Valley, PA and since the crew confirmed that, that’s where I went. Although I would have made a lot more money driving out to Dayton. [(-D]