Friday Fictioneers is a weekly blog link-up based on a photo prompt. The Challenge – write a one hundred word story that has a beginning, middle, and end. (No one will be ostracized for going a few words over the count.) The Key – make every word count. Up to the challenge? Join in!
Procedure for Reporting Unauthorized, Illegally Parked, or Dumped Vehicles on Company Property
Book 3, Chapter 9, Section 2, Subsection AA
- Notice vehicle over several days
- Mention it to the receptionist
- Chat multiple times about the vehicle in question
- Ask who else has noticed
- Gather coworkers who have noticed the vehicle
- Discuss over several meetings; desk-side is appropriate
- Nominate two representatives: one to create and one to send the report
- Discuss the details of the report ad nauseam; desk-side is appropriate
- Email the report, cc “all users”; attach reference Book 2, Chapter 4, Section 8, Subsection M, “Procedure for Receiving Employee-Initiated Nuisance Reports”
- Repeat Steps 1-9 for any nesting wildlife or encroaching plant-life
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100 words. Feedback is always appreciated. Comments of any kind, really–so long as they are related to the post.
What story comes to mind when you see that picture? Join in!
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*Featured and Post Image Copyright – Roger Bultot
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This Is My Corn 
Dear Melanie, Great story! Love it along with other memos, I’m sure this one will make it to the correct pile! Nan 🙂
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It will indeed, and probably to the bottom of that pile. 🙂
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Love where you took this one!
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Thank you Carrie. 🙂
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Really creative twist.
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Thanks! It was fun to do.
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Oh dear! The trouble is this is far too true to life!
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That I work in an office may or may not have contributed to creating this. 🙂
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excellent, creative twist on the prompt.
that’s thinking outside the truck!!
your business must love you.
Randy
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Thank you Randy.
My company does love me (I hope), but not for procedure manuals. 🙂 thankfully.
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Ha! Funny list Melanie. I can just see this happening in a large workplace. it reminded of a another list I used to see regularly. I drove a highway B-train (two trailers hooked to each other with 30 wheels) gas tanker for some years. We loaded at many distribution centers but there was one in Toronto that was anal about safety. Safety was always a huge concern at any fuel loading sites and we had to be “carded” at each site – which involved studying their specific site safety manual, doing multiple (usually a minimum of 10) supervised and recorded loads with a carded driver, taking a written test (90% to pass), taking an industry fuel test, wearing all the appropriate safety equipment including a fire resistant overall, and then passing a test load where a terminal official observes and grades one loading cycle.
Anyway, this Suncor terminal in Toronto did not want us to ever forget the safety rules, so they posted a big sign at each loading rack (there were about 10 which could load a truck each at a time) that listed the 10 steps to take in case of a spill while loading. As one would expect they were very specific and abrupt in the language used on the sign. One day I was loading there and after hooking up and getting the loading started, I was reading the sign to refresh my memory and I noticed that someone had added a number 11 to the end in black marker. It said ” #11 – Proceed directly to the Unemployment Office and stand in line.” Ha!
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That’s a great story, Paul. I would think working with fuel would require an over-abundance of safety regulations, but that’s a whole lot more than I would ever have imagined. I love that someone added a #11. How much truth is in that? Were spills the do-not-make mistake?
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Yep, spills were bad. Sometimes they were equipment failure, which was rare but when it happened you were graded on your response. You could (and I once did) get a commendation for how an unavoidable spill was handled. But the majority (about 90%) of spills were human error – sometimes wierd unexpected stuff. We had a spills and fire training course that was mandatory before even on the job training (training was 3-4 weeks long). I was promoted to Regional Safety Director at that job and saw a lot of stuff. We always did a debrief after every incident to determine cause and discipline. It was a terminable offense if it was stupid or large or the driver lost control. I could write a book on the odd stuff that would sometimes happen. The trucks all had a stash of equipment to deal with spills – covers for manholes (worst scene when a spill gets into the storm sewer system – it can vent back into home basements and ignite), long “socks” filled with an absorbent to circle or direct spills, loose absorbent, pails, shovels( to build earth dams) , absorbent pads,broom, disposal pails, and a thing called plug and dyke – a pretty amazing stuff that I’d never seen before. Plug and dyke was a granular powder we carried in a gallon paint can. You could take a handful in your hand and stick it agianst any small leak (say a hole got poked in a loaded tanker by an impact) and it would become just like putty and block the flow once it got wet with any liquid. It would then harden like a patch for temporary leak control.
Spills at terminals were major non-no’s. Out on the road there are a lot of uncontrolled variables that can cause a spill beyond a driver’s control, but in the terminal everything was controlled. Any avoidable spills would automatically cause termination of loading privilidges, some times for a life time. That alone made your employment redundant. So termination was pretty much assured. I once had an unavoidable spill in a terminal and was patted on the back for it. There are steel loading pipes that attach with a complex valve and lock to a loading pipe on the bottom of each trailer compartment (typically 6 compartments). I attached a loading pipe and the lock lever felt wrong. We had been trained to pay particular notice to this in case the lock was not engaged properly. I shut the valves on the trailer and on the pipe and detached the pipe. The pipe valve (Exxon’s pipe) had failed and the fuel that was remaining in it poured out on the ground – about 75 liters. It would have loaded properly but when I detached after loading we would have had a much greater spill. Anyway, i did all the right things and using the site equipment, I cleaned it up and put everything away when i was done and then pulled to the side and called Exxon’s central reporting facility and gave them a heads up. I then completed an incident report and filed it at the terminal. Then i exited, reported to my boss, and they assigned me to another load until Exxon processed the report in the morning. Exxon checked the video footage (everything, and I mean everything, is recorded inside the terminal) and the report and decided that my good work had saved a much larger spill due to their equuipment failure ( a very rare occurrence by the way) and sent me a commendation. I was first scared shitless and then quite chuffed. Ha!
So, to answer your question – yes, a preventable spill in a termnal would likely lead to termination, unless it was non-preventable.I’ve had some strange situations occurr outside terminals. I was fimishing up delivery to a small rural station one day and when I was done, I unhooked the truck end of the hose (standard procedure) and rolled it up to the inground tank connection, to get the last drops out of the hose. The in-ground connection came off and fell on the ground. My eyes popped as only minutes before I was running about 350 gallons a minute through that connection. – and now it fell off? I checked the connection and realized that the fill pipe itself – the one that projected out of the tank and that we hooked to, had cracked right through from age and failed. If it had failed while I was delivering we would have had easy 200 or more gallons on the parking lot bfore i got it stopped. It was a big spill that almost happened. These tanks are supposed to be inspected and certified yearly and replaced after 25 years – but apparently this one had not been properly checked. Hard to know that. Honestly Melanie, there were no athiests hauling fuel, that I can tell you.
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Hahaha! No atheists hauling fuel. I bet not. I think that would probably make me pretty nervous too. Heck, it makes me nervous just passing a fuel truck on the highway. I usually frighten myself with imagined Hollywood-style explosions happening at the exact moment I’m parallel with the fuel tank.
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If it makes you feel any better Melanie, each accident with a tanker is reviewed by the mannufacturer here in Canada and they incorporate anything they discover on how to make it safer into the following designs. Oddly enough, here, the tankers are all hand built and exceedingly expensive ($275,000 just for one set of trailers and that doesn’t include the tractor). Anywho, they have figured out how to build one that explodes properly. Ha! They are built wth breakaway hatches in the top and when they blow (heaven forbid), they blow upwards. Funny story. One of our competitors had a maintnance facility down the road from our terminal, that would take two complete units taotally inside. They were working on one , one day, and through human error (a mislabelling of a tanker) they were welding on a tanker with gas fumes in it and it blew.There were eight people in the garage at the time, including the mechanic and no one was seriously hurt. When the tank blew it went out through the roof of the building and peeled it back like Godzilla had grabbed the roof and yanked. For about 2 months, it remained that way and we used to tease our competitors about their exploding trailers. The damage was bad enough that they could not fix the building and had to tear it down. Their landlord evicted them.
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That is comforting. Good to know. That had to be a heck of a sight to see that tank fly up through the roof!
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*Unfortunately it happened at night, so only the garage crew saw it happen. And if I was them I’da been too busy getitng clean shorts to notice. Again, there are no athests in fuel. 😀
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Clean shorts! That made me laugh! 🙂
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Haha. Can absolutely believe it!
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It’s pretty much what happens regardless of procedure. 🙂
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Ah, the bureaucracy and red tape of corporate America. We must have policies and procedures for everything, right down to the number of toilette paper squares allotted for each visit to the restroom. Great take on the prompt.
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And, apparently, how much time is allowed in the restroom, like at the WaterSaver Faucet Co.
Thank you Russell.
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I have a feeling this truck will be sitting there for some time! Nothing says trouble like an abandoned vehicle. Great take!
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Probably until it’s completely covered in ivy.
Thanks!
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Melanie, This was all the more hilarious because it sounds true. 😀 Looks like it provides a job for someone. I wonder if there’s a course entitled “How to Apply Red Tape.” Well written. 🙂 —Susan
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Thank you Susan!
No matter the actual procedure, this is probably pretty close to how it actually works. At least in my experience. 🙂
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You hooked me with your title!
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Thanks Dawn! Titles are such a tricky thing. 🙂
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Yes they are!
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“Ask who else has noticed” – I love the deadpan quality of that 🙂
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Thank you Blake!
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