High winds and high-profile vehicles don’t mix

For some people, a windy day means a bad hair day or tying down the patio furniture. For trucking companies, it means making sure their trailers don’t tip over during a powerful gust.

“We really have issues when they (the box trailers) are empty,” said Jason Andrus, the CFO for Doug Andrus Distributing in Idaho Falls. “It’s kind of like a sail on a boat. It really catches the wind and it can move them around.”

Semi-trucks are one of the major reasons why the National Weather Service issues wind advisories or occasionally high wind warnings. “Wind advisories usually mean wind around 20 to 35 miles per hour for long periods of time,” said First Alert Chief Meteorologist Michael Coats. “High-wind warnings could push the winds up to that 50 or 60 miles per hour range.”

Companies like Andrus Distributing LLC deliver all over the country, meaning it’s too difficult for dispatch to monitor the weather conditions everywhere their drivers are. Instead they rely on their drivers to make smart decisions.

“Twenty percent of our drivers have had over million miles with our company. So they have the experience to help them be safe and react to those situations.” said Andrus. “Safety is very important to us. So we’re focused on doing what we need to keep our drivers safe, our equipment safe, and the motoring public safe,”

Andrus also said in the case of high winds, many of the drivers will pull off the road and wait until conditions improve, especially in unpredictably gusty areas like the Snake River Plain.

“The Snake River Plain is notorious for strong wind gusts, especially along I-15 and I-86,” said Coats. “Truck drivers have a very tough time here during wind storms.”