Owner-operator Tim Pulli's 2007 Mack ended a fateful day in 2012 tipped over on its side after a passenger-vehicle driver he couldn't avoid essentially pulled out into the Tri-State Tollway around Chicago, attempting to cross four lanes of high-speed traffic from a dead stop.All photos courtesy of Pulli Express, Inc.
"That was a lesson learned," said Shelley Puzek-Pulli, making reference to the picture you see up top here -- results of a crash that her husband, Tim Pulli, was involved in almost 11 years ago to the day. He was a little more than a half-decade into his time as an owner-operator, leased to a carrier and, that fateful day, hauling hydrochloric acid.
Some lessons are learned after motivational factors present themselves from within. Others, like this one, are instigated from without.
"That truck was really nice," Tim said of the 2007 Mack, "very low miles when we got it," moving into tanking after dump work in and around their home in greater Chicago. He was on the Tri State Tollway around the city that day when a "random driver decided to do a U-turn on the toll road," crossing back over from the other side of the freeway. He didn't make it back across the crowded four-lane. The collision and Tim's efforts to avoid it "put the truck on its side ... and spilled hydrochloric acid" all over the road.
"All four lanes were full," Tim said, "everybody was moving and he thought he could make it across."
Fortunately, Tim emerged uninjured. Not so the truck, and more importantly, at that time, the Pullis, owner-operators of Pulli Express, Inc., had three young children at home. "We had a meeting and discussed that maybe hazmat is not where we should be," Shelley said, and began casting a net for a new niche within tank work.
