driving

DRY HEAT OR HUMID HEAT?  NOPE TO BOTH!

/ misssarahetc / Leave a comment

I was born and bred in SW Washington State, where we might see a weeks worth of temps over 95 degrees during the summer.  As a pilot car driver, I sometimes work in the midwest.  This summer, I’ve found myself  working in both the midwest and southwest.

After telling a few friends about my having to pilot super loads from Iowa to Arizona, I heard nothing but “Arizona’s hot, but it’s a dry heat.”  What the hell?!  Hot is hot, I’ve never cared if it was dry or humid. Boy,  was I in for a steep learning curve!

Let’s start with Iowa.  My first day in the South East corner of the state where the laydown yard for our wind turbine components were stored and along the Mississippi River the temperature was 85 degrees and I thought “that’s not so bad.”  Then I got out of my nice cool car and tried to take a deep breath.  The first feel of that humid and hot air took my breath away.  It seemed my skin started to feel sticky within a few seconds.  I could FEEL the sweat, starting to form on my neck and back.  

That first experience with truly humid summer weather was completely overwhelming. For those of you who were born and raised there, I can hear you chuckling or sighing a huge, irritating sigh. 

This was my first trip to the midwest during this type of weather.  I had worked there in the winter and loved it. I was used to driving and living in cold weather.  This was completely different than anything I had experienced.  I tried to work on a doily I was crocheting and found the thread just wouldn’t glide through my fingers.  My steel crochet hook stuck to my fingers and hands. 

As the sun started to go down, a whole new bunch of experiences started to happen.  Bugs that will eat the livin’ crap out of you in an instant!  We have mosquitoes at home in Washington, but the ones that are in the midwest are on a different level.  They’re tiny, don’t make a sound, and seem impervious to any type of bug spray.  There is also some sort of “No-see-um” that will chew through any type of clothing right into your skin.  After that first night of sleeping in my car with the windows down, I had dozens of bites all over me.  Even my little road dog, Dakota, had bites all over the top of her head like little raised pimples. 

Then I started seeing tiny little flashes of light that seemed to come off the stalks of corn in an adjacent field, which butted up against the parking lot of the truck stop I was parked in. Now I’ve heard stories from family members about Fire Flies or Lightening Bugs; whatever it is a person wants to call them. But to see them for real and the realization that those people who told you stories of collecting them in jars, pinching off their little butts to put on your fingernails or ear lobes as earrings were telling the truth!  There really was such a thing as a bug that lit up;  they did fly,  and I was scared shitless of them.  I just couldn’t wrap my head around an insect that really did this.  I’m getting used to seeing them, but it’s taking me a while not to jump out of my skin when walking Dakota out after dark and these little streaks of light flash into the air. 

So let’s move on to Arizona.  My first experience with Arizona was this: at about 95 degrees my 2016 Subaru outback decided “screw this, I don’t like this heat and I”m gonna make your A/C go all wonky on you.”  Which it did.  I had it on the lowest temp I could go and the fan all the way up.  Nothin’  it was blowing hot air.  If I sped up it would kind of work.  But I’m a high pole car, running about 3/4 of a mile in front of my blade and have to pace my driver with the load behind me so that I’m not too far out for them to hear me or too close for them to maneuver around an obstacle in the road or vehicle pulled over on the road when I call it out on the cb radio.  So this means my speed stays at about 55-60 miles an hour.  

I finally decided to shut off my A/C and put the windows down.  It was horrible, but we had air flow.  After a while, Dakota had drank all the water in her bowl.  She started drinking it out of my water cup and it went ok for a while.  Then she started to really go down hill, laying on her side and panting hard.  Our load with the blade and the truck is over 200 feet long.  We don’t fit in most places and just parking on the side of the road is a safety hazzard to the motoring public.  We had about an hour to get to our destination in Arizona, so I told our blade crew of 3 that we’d just push through and onto our laydown site.

We got to the laydown yard and I rushed Dakota to a friend of mine who was waiting with cool, wet towels and functioning A/C in her pick up.  I made a call to my Subaru Guru in Washington, who referred me to a Subaru Guru in Phoenix.  It was 113 degrees while we were on our way there. We finally  arrived that night and found a nice comfy truck stop to stay in overnight.  It was a tolerable night with the temperature going down to about 80- 85 degrees. For whatever reason, it didn’t seem that warm.

The next morning we dropped my car off at the home based shop of my Pheonix Subaru Guru mechanic and took off in my friends pick up.  We found a gorgeous park and went for a walk to look at flower beds, the small lake with fountains in the middle of it and for Dakota to run around.  I realized there wasn’t the hot and sticky feeling I’d experienced in the midwest.  My skin wasn’t soaking with sweat. It was very hot at around 10am.  I think it was upwards of 90 degrees, but it honestly didn’t feel that hot.  I just can’t explain it, I know it wasn’t just me, my friend mentioned it too.  As we were looking at flowers growing in outdoor flower beds that I can only grow in my house where they can sit in a sunny window; we also realized we hadn’t been chewed up by bugs overnight.  Not a single bug bite!  We slept in peace all night with our windows all the way down too! 

The only real bug I saw were huge bumble bees flying unbievabley slow between flowers in the grass of the park.  We saw warning signs of scorpions and rattlesnakes, but thankfully, we didn’t see any of those. 

We spent most of the day in the Pheonix heat, but it seemed like I adapted to it pretty quick.  Weird huh? It was about 105 dgrees, but with out the added sweatiness of humid heat it was bearable.  I picked my car up in the late afternoon with working A/C and we left town about 5ish to head back north to Iowa for another load. 

I have to say I know exactly what people are talking about now when I hear them say, “it’s a dry heat”  when talking about the southwest united states.  There is truly a difference between humid heat and dry heat.  After being in both with in such a short period of time,  I have to go with the dry heat of the southwest.  For me, it isn’t as miserable as the humid heat we experienced in the midwest.  Even though I live in the cooler climate of the Pacific Northwest, I found that I adapted to the dry heat of the southwest much better than the hot and humid climate in the midwest. 

Pilot Car (PEVO) Lingo

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“You gotta run the zipper across this bridge”, “We’re gonna have to shoo-fly this pork chop to make it around the left turn”

This is a partial list of Lingo used while piloting oversize/over dimensional loads to help out new PEVO’s who are unfamiliar with industry specific Lingo. Most of these terms are used continually by all members of an oversize crew including the truck driver, front door/pole car, back door and steerman.
Stretched out Wind Turbine Blade trailers heading to a designated area to shrink up.

PILOT CAR LINGO

Every industry has its own lingo and Oversize/Over dimensional Pilot Car Drivers are no different.  This mostly incomplete list will give the Pilot Car Driver, AKA Escort, AKA PEVO (Pilot Escort Vehicle Operator) a good working knowledge of commonly used Oversize terms used to perform your duties as a Pilot Car driver along with some lesser used terms.

There are no training classes per se.  Other than the instruction and testing you’ll get when you go through your PEVO certification course; this industry is pretty much all “school of hard knocks” e.g. learning as you go along. This glossary of Pilot Car terms is to help Newbie Pilots.  To help them navigate their first few trips until saying these well recognized terms not only helps you to familiarize yourself but it will help you to become a valuable part of any Oversize team.

FOUR Any 4 wheeled passenger vehicle driven by a regular motorist.

TAG A trailer being towed behind a vehicle.  e.g., “4 with a tag on the shoulder”

ALLIGATOR More commonly called a GATOR.  These are shredded pieces of tires laying in or along the side of the road.  *When the tread is facing up, they resemble the backs of alligators.

MUSTARD The yellow striping to the left of lane 1. *The inside or left lane.

FOG LINE The white line at the right edge of the outside right lane (on multiple lane roads) or at the right side of the lane you are traveling in.

ZIPPER The broken lines separating the lanes or 2 way traffic.

UP Used by the Chase car or Steerman to let the driver know a vehicle is going to pass the load. e.g. “4 and a tag “up”.

18 A Semi truck. Regular sized semi tractor/trailers have 18 wheels.

WIGGLE- WAGON    A semi with 2 trailers.  In Canada these are referred to as “B-Trains”.

PARKING LOT    A semi that hauls passenger vehicles.

BACK DOOR    Another name for a Chase Pilot Car. Always at the back of the load. Blocks traffic in lanes when the driver has to change lanes, letting your driver know of approaching traffic that may interfere with the safe travel of the load.  The back door also calls out distances of the back axles to the edge of the shoulder on turns when there is no Steerman.  *Ask your driver what he/she wants called out.

STEERMAN Also a Chase but their main responsibility as the Steerman is always being located at the back of the load when rolling to allow for Steering the load. Their duties also include helping to Load/Unload. 

LEAD Also known  as the FRONT DOOR Pilot Car.  Duties include reading the permit for routing and pertinent information for the load, instructing the driver/team on turns, warning the driver of obstacles whether in the lane of travel or on the shoulder in which the load has to change lanes or maneuver to get around, accidents, animals entering the roadway etc.  *Always ask  your driver what they want called out.  

WEIGH STATION   Also known as a “SCALE or CHICKEN SHACK”. Normally all oversize loads will have to enter the scale unless it’s on your permit to bypass it due to permanent closure or construction. You’ll see an illuminated red/green  sign with “open” or “closed”.  It’ll be about a mile before the scale.  Whether the sign reads open or closed, call it out to your team. When you enter,  DO NOT DRIVE ACROSS  the scale.  There’ll be a by-pass lane usually to the left of the scale lane, use this lane for going through the scale. 

PORK CHOP  Pork chops are small islands that help separate oncoming turn lanes from other turning lanes.  They’re found at intersections and usually have a stop sign on them.  These small islands look like pork chops.

SHOO-FLY This maneuver involves making a wrong-way turn into the oncoming traffic lane when the turn is too tight or there are obstacles keeping you from making the turn the lane you are traveling in.  This often involves an intersection with a PORK CHOP.

GYPSY WAGON A RV or towable camper rig.

SPLITTING LANES   This maneuver involves your driver to drive over the top of the ZIPPER separating 2 lanes.  Wider loads may choose to do this in heavy traffic. *This is also called RUNNING THE ZIPPER.

CENTER UP This maneuver is literally what it says.  It’s used when going through narrower portions of the roadway or across bridges.

OUT This term is specifically for LEAD/POLE CARS    “You’re too far OUT”, meaning too far away from the load.  “You need to get OUT further”.  Meaning you’re too close to the load.

DOWN THE BELLY Meaning down the center of the lane you are traveling in.  “metal debris “down the belly”

As I said before, this is by no means a complete list of the lingo used in the Oversized/Over dimensional industry.  I can imagine some of these terms sound silly or make no sense to a new pilot but believe me, before you know it you’re going to be using them in normal conversations you have while on the job and may even slip and use them when talking to friends or family while explaining your day as a PEVO.  Piloting is not an exact science and talking to 5 different pole cars about how to perform their duties will give you 5 different answers.  

My best advice to a Newbie is to take everything in;  pretty soon you’ll figure out what is valuable information and what isn’t.  NO QUESTION IS A DUMB QUESTION!  

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Curious Horses checking me out in Dubois, Idaho