Attention hunters

[Dan Morris]

On the way to work this morning, on C470 SW Denver metro, in a 1 1/2 mile stretch, 3 hunting groups lost utility trailers they were towing. 1.... an accident....3....no way. If you stop to eat or sleep, check your trailer connections.....we have a lot of PETA here. Fortunantly, none crossed median and did injury.
Dan

[skeeter@ccia.com]

Dan, that rule of checking trailer connections applies to anything anyone tows for any reason. Boats, campers, utility. Good point to remind us. I use to drive tractor trailer and you would not believe how many people for some dumb reason or another walk around a truck and pull the pin on the trailer. I think maybe they just like to watch someone drive out from under them. And it does happen.

[Mr. 16 gauge]

I had this happen to me several years ago; someone pulled the cotter pin on my trailer hitch and while driving down the freeway, my other pin came out and the hitch came undone! Fortunately, the chains saved me. A friend of mine taught me to cross the chains undernieth the tongue of the trailer, and that's what it fell on. Heard an awful "THUD" when it happened....looked in the rearview and saw that the boat was sitting lower than it usually does.
I managed to get the hitch back in and used the outboard motor lock to secure it temporarily for the ride home. I now use a lock mechanism on the pin that holds the hitch in place.
Don't know who did it, or why.....couldn't need a cotter pin that badly, could you?

[Rapier]

I have also had several customers loose trailers at restaurants, where the trailer, or trailer and boat were just removed from the rear of the vehicle. Keep your trailer hitch locked and the vehicle in view when you stop.

Last year I had the local County chief deputy loose his trailer at Tulsa on Saturday night. Stolen from the parking lot. So it can happen to anyone. That trailer was locked and the thieves just cut the lock off.

So when towing a trailer you should keep an eye out for all kinds of mischief when you stop. There are some very sick puppies out and about.
Ed

[skeeter@ccia.com]

oh and lights and light bulbs are another big item to check on...just hope you are not the last man out of the lot...but we did haver our boat trailer lights stolen while in erie a few years back....drove home without them but it was daylight then....how come nobody ever catches these guys? Guess car break-ins are happening in Erie for those that might venture that way for Steelhead.

[Rapier]

Skeet,
Could be like me, barn and travel trailer at farm broken into, about 2K stolen. Caught the guy, he confessed. At the hearing he was awaiting hearings on 5 more..... Oh, we caught him but he is not going to make restitution and as it was burgulary of unoccupied structures, he will probably be given a new food stamp voucher and sent home.
Ed

[popplecop]

Another thing trailer towers forget is wheel bearings, see alot of boat trailers along the road disabled because of this. Going years back when I was a traffic officer most trailer towing accidents could be attributed to cheap hitches, no working break and tail lights and lack of safety chains. Also hard to believe how many with pull a trailer without a spare tire for it.

[skeet]

Spare Tarr?? Well what the heck fer..it only has two..It ain't like yer pick'em up truck..ya need one fer it..If'n it gets a flat well ya ain't going nowhere ya know. If'n that there trailer gits a flat..well you can still pull 'er down the road..maybe not farr..but it'll slide till the thing falls apart don'tcha know... LOL!! I actually heard just about that exactly one day.. He were a West(by Gawd) Virginia TPT feller. Ain't nothing wrong from being from WVa it just happend to be where he was from..not where he lived at the time...That was Robin Hood Dell TP in Anne Arundel County Md..LOL