Giving Tuesday, an annual event that started on Facebook (I think) and has since morphed into all sorts of activities, is coming up. Always the Tuesday after Thanksgiving, this year it will be December 2.
My dad as a young man.
For the past several years I’ve used the date to raise funds for the Truck Safety Coalition, and I will this year too. I like to give you all a heads up before so that you can do your research and think about where you’d like to donate your hard earned money.
As always I remind everyone that large truck crashes aren’t partisan. The semi that slams into the back of your car doesn’t care whether you’re Republican or Democrat. It doesn’t care what race or gender or religion you are. It’s irrelevant whether you have family waiting for you at home or only your pet dog.
Still way before me.
Dad lived alone back in 2004 when he put his suitcase in the trunk of his car and headed for the Atlanta airport in the predawn hours of December 23rd. He didn’t know he’d never make it to the airport. I picture him pulling up the driveway for that last time, blissfully unaware of what waited for him.
More than 5,000 people die in crashes involving large trucks every year. More than 100,000 are injured. It’s not all the trucking industry’s fault, some of it is caused by those of us in cars doing stupid things. Both sides of that issue warrent additional vigilance on the road.
For the record, dad was slowed in traffic that was being guided around a previous wreck when he was hit from behind by a semi driven by a sleepy driver who didn’t see all the traffic stopped ahead of him.
The Truck Safety Coalition was there for my family 20 years ago and it’s still there for families that have been turned upside down by a crash. TSC provides support and advice and the opportunity to use their grief to make change for the better.
The obligitory church photo.
So I’m asking you to consider donating to the Truck Safety Coalition for Giving Tuesday this year. I’ll post again with a link soon. You don’t have to wait until December 5th to donate, but you can if you want to.
I’ll be sure to remind you.
Dad, ever on my mind and especially as we approach his crash anniversary, tells me to tell you thanks for the years of support you’ve given me and my family. And thanks for considering making a donation this year too.
Time is sliding away again, as it does, and I want to tell you about our time at the end of September in Washington DC.
Reagan National Airport from the Metro platform.
This year we did something different in that we combined the big fundraising dinner with our biannual Sorrow to Strength conference. We’ve been doing the conference for as long as I’ve been with the Truck Safety Coalition, more than 20 years. But we’ve only done the annual fundraising Gala twice before.
We were in town to make a point.
The objective in doing it all during the same weekend was to save everybody some money. The hotel gave us a discount for doing 2 events, back to back. And we, as volunteers would only have to pay to travel to DC once.
Change is hard.
The Gala, on Friday night, was fun, the food was delicious, and we raised a decent amount of money between sponsors and volunteer donations. But we still have a long way to go before we can say we’ve raised our entire annual budget –we’ll be scrambling at year end just like every year, but we’re getting better at finding funding sources.
It was a lovely evening.
Satrday morning people were invited to attend a session where the staff and a few volunteers showed us the ‘roadshow’ they’ve been doing the last two years.
Showing us one of the very first underride guards built.
In 2023 we received a grant from the DOT (Department of Transportation) to meet with at least six police departments across the country and talk about underride crashes, and how to designate them on crash reports.
We and the DOT feel these types of crashes, where a passenger vehicle goes under a tractor trailer, are under reported, both because some police departments don’t know enough about them, and because on most police crash reports there is nothing to indicate underride.
We dream about getting to zero.
We heard from a volunteer who had spoken at some of the shows, and with the manufactor of an underride guard that is being put on some trucks in some cities now. It was all very interesting and hopeful.
A Texas retired crash reconstructionist spoke at our road shows and our conference.
Then Saturday afternoon we met with the families and survivors and shared our stories. As usual this was a traumatic and overwhelmingly emotional time. This year there were so many new families. More than half of us in the room were there for the first time, and their families had suffered loss so recently.
So much to learn at our conference.
It breaks my heart. We’re glad they found us, but we wish the trends were going down. They are not. More than 5500 people died in crashes with commercial trucks in 2023, the last year we have data for. Over 150,000 were injured.
And some if not all of the safety measured we’ve fought years for are being rolled back.
Sunday we learned about the issues, and there are many. We focused, though, on a couple we think we can make progress on. We think safety is nonpartisan, but not all issues are. The two we spoke most about certainly are.
Just up the road from our conference hotel.
We think AEB (Automatic Emergency Braking) should be required to be included on all new buildsof all sizes of commercial trucks. For awhile we actually had the DOT headed that way, but then the trucking industry pushed back and the smaller trucks, those like box trucks, dump trucks, utility trucks, were taken out of the rule. We want all trucks to be required to have AEB. There are all sorts of little delivery trucks running around our neighborhoods now. Why wouldn’t we want them to stop when someone pulls out of a driveway or a kid rides his bike across the road? AEB is already on many cars, people are getting used to it. Why not include it on all trucks?
And drug testing in fatal crashes. It’s already a thing that is supposed to happen. Companies are required to get their drivers tested if there is a fatal crash. But 40% of these drivers are NOT being tested. The companies just blow off the requirement and if caught pay a fine. In my dad’s case the driver was not tested. My dad, dead and at the morgue, had blood pulled and tested. Why, I don’t know. A 75 year old man, stopped in traffic, was tested for being impaired, but the driver of the truck that hit and killed him was not.
Then Monday we went to the Hill to talk to staffers about our issues. DC and the area around the Hill was uncharacteristically quiet. It was two days before the potential government shutdown. Members, if they were in town, were on the floors of their chambers. Staffers were nervous and preoccupied.
Everybody was worried and a bit discouraged too.
In addition to Hill meetings I was also lucky enough to attend and speak at a meeting with other volunteers and a TSC staff person at the DOT where I met the probable new Administrator for FMCSA (Federa Motor Carrier Safety Administration). He hasn’t been confirmed yet, but he likely will be. I think he’s going to be good, his background is police work and he said all the right things. But then, they all say all the right things in the beginning. I will reserve judgement until I see what he does.
The Acting Administrator is not in this image…as he’s not confirmed yet.
Overall I think our meetings went well, or as well as we can expect in these times. Best of all? The new families rocked it. They moved out confidently, told their unimaginable stories of loss, and talked about our two issues (and any others that they felt called upon to talk about) with folks who have the ears of those who need to make the changes.
Sen. Peters is from my state, but he’s retiring which makes me sad.
That’s why it’s called Sorrow to Strength. They come to the conference in overwelming grief, they share that grief and it gets a tiny bit easier to bear among others like them. They learn some new skills, they practice those skills, and they go back out into the world a little stronger, more confident and maybe feeling less hopeless.
And that’s how our four days in Wasington DC went.
Part of our ‘debriefing’ after all our meetings were over. (No I hadn’t started drinking when I took this!)
Of course I’ll be asking for donations again during our Giving Tuesday campaign in November. And maybe next April for my birthday. But you can donate any time. Just go to trucksafety.org and push the DONATE button.
Dad and I thank you. And thanks for reading all of this.
Many of you know the story about my dad and the semi-truck. I wish I could say I wrote a kids’ book about a daddy driving a big truck.
Dad and his baby sister.
But that’s not the way it went.
In reality my dad was driving to the Atlanta airport December 23, 2004, a plane ticket in his shirt pocket, heading north to spend Christmas with his family.
He loved water his entire life.
Around 6 a.m. with an hour to go, he was hit from behind by a semi-truck who’s driver didn’t notice all the traffic slowing in front of him.
A college man.
Dad never had a chance.
The semi driver said he fell asleep after driving all night, trying to get a load of electronics to Atlanta for Christmas sales. His dispatcher had enticed him to make a deadline in Atlanta in order to have another truck ready for him to drive to Florida, getting him home to his family for Christmas.
A married man.
My dad didn’t get to spend Christmas with his family. The driver didn’t get to spend Christmas with his family either, he spent it in jail. My siblings and I spent Christmas in shock, sitting in dad’s house, looking at the Christmas tree he’d put up before he left.
Trying to make sense of it all.
A new father.
And in the following months we found the Truck Safety Coalition, made up of CRASH, (Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways), and PATT (Parents Against Tired Truckers). It’s a group of people who have had similar experiences with large commercial trucks.
A dad and his girls.
Sons, daughters, grandkids, parents, friends, spouses, nobody is immune, we all travel our roads alongside big trucks. TSC supports survivors and victims’ families. It educates policy makers on common sense changes that need to be made to make us all, truck drivers included, safer.
A family man.
But we can’t do any of it without financial support. We’re a 501c3 nonprofit. We struggle, as do many groups, to fund the activities that give families hope. Giving Tuesday is one of our biggest fundraising days.
This year it’s on December 3rd.
Everybody growing up.
And, this year, we’re trying something a bit different. In addition to using the Facebook platform, we’re asking folks to donate directly to us. Here’s the link to my personal fundraising page: https://secure.qgiv.com/event/trucksafetycoalitionpeertopeer/account/1899034/. Give it a click and see dad’s story and my progress toward my goal.
You don’t have to wait until December 3rd to donate. We’re starting our campaign right now. In fact you could be my very first donor!
Always interested, always busy.
I said it on Facebook the other evening; I fully believe that Dad says thank you to everyone that has supported me and my siblings all these twenty years. We needed you and you were there. And along the way I’ve met even more supportive people. You’ve all helped me help TSC to continue the work that helped us in our worst moments.
Retired.
The circle of support continues. Round and round, as you helped us, we are supporting the new families who keep on coming. Truck crashes continue, families are irreversibly changed, we provide support, and in time, they grow and get stronger and provide support for the next family.
More than 5,000 people die in commercial truck crashes each year. More than 100,000 people are injured. There are so many families.
We are working hard to help as many families as we can, and it all begins with your support. So thank you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart, from the bottom of my dad’s heart.
Today is Giving Tuesday. Go to Facebook and donate to your favorite charity.
Trust me, the staff and volunteers will appreciate it! Every dollar counts!
In my own fundraising campaign we’re making progress. I’m over $800 of my $1500 goal. I’m so thankful for every dollar and every person who donates. I’m also appreciative of every one of you that sends me virtual (and real) hugs and warm thoughts and comforting messages.
Never think you don’t make a difference. You all do.
I have a few images from dad’s childhood. He was six years older than his little sister, my Aunt Becky.
My dad and his baby sister.
She loved her big brother so much, when he was killed by a tired semitruck driver December 23, 2004, she was heartbroken. They are together in heaven now, I imagine it was a pretty special reunion.
Hanging out in Ann Arbor MI.
This coming Tuesday is Giving Tuesday. I hope you will consider giving to the nonprofit I’ll be highlighting, CRASH (Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways) which is a partner with P.A.T.T (Parents Against Tired Truckers) to form the Truck Safety Coalition.
One of my favorite images of the two of them.
We provide support to families of those lost in semi crashes, and to those who have survived crashes too. Every year there are more heartbroken families.
He loved being on the water.
And we work hard at changing regulations, rules and laws in order to protect everyone on the road. But the crash statistics are going up, more than 5,000 dead, almost 150,000 injured in 2021, the last year for which we have numbers.
And he loved all kinds of boats.
So we can’t give up, can’t even slow down now. Please consider helping us on our mission to provide comfort, to make a place for families to put their grief, and to make our roads safer for everyone, truck drivers included.
Wading in Charlevoix Bay.
Thank you for the years of support you’ve already given me.
A week from Tuesday is Facebook’s Giving Tuesday. I’ll be putting up a fundraiser for the Truck Safety Coalition like I have for the past few years.
This year feels different than past years where I’ve promoted an upcoming Giving Tuesday off an on for a few weeks. This year there are other things going on in my life and Giving Tuesday has kind of snuck up on me.
Heck the whole holiday season has snuck up on me.
Regardless, I know many of you will support my effort to raise some funds for the Truck Safety Coalition. (If you didn’t read this post about our latest fundraiser, please give it a look.) You’re so good that way, supportive of an issue most people can’t imagine ever touching their own family.
That’s how we felt too, until it did.
I feel like a broken record when I say over and over that truck crashes are indiscriminate. They happen to people in all parts of the country, in every community, every religion, every political viewpoint. Young people, old people, people with kids. People’s kids. Nobody is immune.
So, next week, on Giving Tuesday, please take a moment and think about all of us in the Truck Safety family, a family we never wanted to join, but a family we’re all so very grateful to have found.
Sadly there have been new families joining us this year, people we need to comfort and support. Your dollars do that.
Thank you for supporting my mission to help those families, and to work on changing the way things are on our roads.
And thank you for supporting me, even when I’m on my soapbox.
Spreading the word.
Note: images in today’s post are from my last walk at Shiawasee Nature Preserve. I haven’t had time to share them with you, and I thought you’d like the distraction from such a serious topic.
Long time readers know that my dad was killed by a tired trucker almost twenty years ago and I and members of my family volunteer with the Truck Safety Coalition, working to make our roads safer.
My dad and me many years ago.
TSC is based in Washington DC, but has families of volunteers all across the country. Of course it does, because truck crashes aren’t restricted to ‘somewhere else’ like we all want to believe.
Truck crashes happen anywhere and to anyone.
Flags at half mast for Senator Feinstein.
It takes money to keep our organization going, to pay our small staff, to help families come to DC for conferences or important meetings, to pay for grief counseling for those that want that help, to run the website that provides information to new families, and where we post our stories about the loved ones we lost and about the lives changed forever for those injured in crashes with trucks.
It takes money.
And it’s not so easy to raise money for our cause. Organizations that might have sympathy for our families, like truck part manufacturers, can’t be seen associating with us, because many of the truck companies they sell parts to are so often on the other side of our arguments. Trailer manufacturers sell to truck companies too and steer clear of us, as do some road safety equipment manufacturers and many others.
It’s hard to explain that we aren’t anti truck, we support safe trucking. It’s important to remember that truck drivers die in crashes too, and that driving a truck is one of the most dangerous jobs in our country.
The halls of Congress where we look for support for safety.
A lot of our funding comes from individuals who have had family or friends injured or killed as well as survivors of truck crashes. The people that have already paid the price for unsafe policies and regulations continue to pay in an effort to make things better.
Every single family will tell you they continue to tell their stories, continue to come to meetings, continue to donate because they don’t want another family to experience a truck crash. Every single family comes to TSC with the same wish in their hearts.
To make it stop.
The Washington Monument during a walk after our event.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says that over 5,700 people died in truck related crashes in 2021, the latest year from which we have data. That’s a 71% increase since 2009. Truck crashes are trending the wrong way. More people are being killed every year. And injuries are going up too, over 155,000 are injured every year.
Think about that. Every single year 155,000 people are injured in truck crashes. Ford Field, home of the Detroit Lions, has 65,000 seats. Every year 2.3 football stadiums of people are injured in truck crashes. And the numbers keep climbing.
So this past weekend my husband and I traveled, on our own dime, to DC where we attended an evening of celebration of those that have contributed to TSC. Donors, safety advocates, board members, friends and supporters gathered together to recognize some very special people who, during this past year, have gone above and beyond to move our mission to make our roads safer going forward.
All waiting for something. Just like us.
It was a good evening and we raised some money. We felt warm and happy with our effort, but don’t think I won’t be asking you for support this November during Giving Tuesday. Because 5,700+ people died in 2021, and it will likely be a larger number for 2022 and 2023. Whole football stadiums of people are being injured. We can’t stop now.
Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton graciously speaks to our group.
Thank you in advance for supporting me, for the dollars you donate whenever I ask, for your emotional support when I’m having a meltdown, or when I’m just missing my dad. Thank you for letting me get on my soapbox once in awhile, and for not turning away when I tell you about really sad things that make me (and many of you) really angry.
The Capitol at the end of another busy day.
Last weekend was a time of celebration, but now it’s time to get back to work. We’re trying to get the speed limiter past the finish line at the DOT, and we’re working on getting Automatic Emergency Brakes in all trucks sooner rather than later. And don’t get me started on the minimum liability insurance issue. Or those companies that want longer trailers, and the ability to haul heavier loads. There are already triple trailers on some of our nation’s roads and we’re keeping watch so they don’t get permission to move onto more.
Passing a triple trailer truck on the Pennsylvania turnpike.
We need to keep holding our fingers in the truck safety dike. And we need money to do that.
I can’t let another day go by without sending out a great big THANK YOU to all of you that supported my Giving Tuesday Facebook fundraiser for the Truck Safety Coalition. Monetary donations, as well as verbal and written support, all made my day. Sometimes I feel that working to make our roads safer is too hard, maybe even impossible, and I feel lonely in the fight. But you proved to me, once again, that I’m not alone, and that many people care about the victims and their families as well as the underlying purpose.
I started out with a goal of raising $1,000, the same amount I struggled to raise last year. I put the fundraiser up the evening before Giving Tuesday because I was afraid I’d have technical problems trying to do it early Tuesday. I don’t know why I assume things won’t go as planned, but I didn’t have any trouble getting the page to work, and by late evening I was already close to goal.
Well. I couldn’t start Giving Tuesday with only a couple hundred dollars to raise all day, so I upped the goal to $1200, and was quickly nearing that goal too. So I boosted it again to $1500 and by afternoon was slightly over. It felt kind of like cheating to raise it again, but I did, one last time, to $2000 and several more friends helped me make that final goal. I should have just started at $2000, but that felt so far out of the realm of reality, and I was afraid of failure.
Lesson learned.
So thank you. You give me renewed hope that the world can be a pretty wonderful place, and people are kind and compassionate and generous. You gave what you could, and it was, as a blogger friend of mine often says, enough.
We’re going live tomorrow! I’ve rarely done any live work on Facebook before, but tomorrow is the day! The Truck Safety Coalition will be featuring volunteers, board members and staff in short presentations and interviews every hour on the hour between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m tomorrow. You can see it all on their Facebook page.
I’m live at 10:00 a.m. I’ve been practicing, but you never know how it will really go. I’m not sure I can get through it without crying, so I may end up doing an abbreviated version. Or maybe tears are just what we need for people to realize how important safety is for us all.
Anyway.
Below is what I’m planning to say. What actually comes out of my mouth tomorrow may be completely different.
Hey everybody! My name is Dawn King. I’ve been a volunteer with the Truck Safety Coalition for more than 15 years. When people first hear me talk about volunteering with TSC they assume I’m a retired truck driver or something.
But that’s not it.
I volunteer with TSC to honor my dad. Some of you know that he was killed a couple days before Christmas back in 2004 when he was driving to the airport to catch a flight, planning to spend the holidays with family.
He was on the interstate, early in the morning of December 23rd when he came upon a small crash. He would have called it a fender bender. Police, ambulance and fire trucks were already on the scene, and traffic was slowly being directed around the crash.
Dad was in back of a semi, and both of them, along with most of the rest of traffic, managed to slow down and move into the left lane. But the semi behind dad never saw the slowed traffic. He never saw all those revolving emergency lights on that dark early morning. The semi behind dad slammed into him with the cruise control still engaged. Dad’s vehicle was pushed into the semi ahead of him, then spun out into the median. Dad was partially ejected through a rear window even though he was wearing his seatbelt.
They say he died instantly.
What should have been a joyous time of year turned into tragedy and my family’s lives were changed forever. Dad was the trunk of our family tree, our last living parent. Without him I and my 3 siblings felt lost. We had no idea what we should do next, where we should turn.
And then someone searching randomly on the internet came across the Truck Safety Coalition and I called them asking for advice. And that’s where it all began.
TSC helped connect us to an attorney who in turn told me the things I needed to do immediately to protect our interests. That was a big first step. And the further we got into the process the more I realized how huge the problems are in the trucking industry. How often the families who are injured or killed are considered just another cost of doing business.
Every one of my siblings said they wanted to do something, to make sure no one ever had to go through the pain we were experiencing. And volunteering for this organization is how we’re making a difference.
Volunteering for TSC changed my life, it gave me a place to put my anger and my grief. It gave me the opportunity to help other people. To make positive change. It gave me a direction.
We know we won’t stop all crashes. We know change is slow and difficult. But every step we make toward protecting both the motoring public AND the drivers of these trucks saves someone an injury, saves a life, keeps a family together. Even though we can’t identify specific individuals who weren’t involved in a crash because , for example, a double 33 foot trailer wasn’t on their highway, we know that working to keep longer double 33 foot trailers off many of our roads has saved lives.
The Truck Safety Coalition was there when my family needed it. And we want to make sure they continue to be there for all the families, especially the new families far into the future. People are beginning their long treks through grief and pain every single year. Approximately 5,000 people die each year in crashes with commercial trucks. Over 150,000 are injured!
You never think it will happen to you or your family until it does.
It takes money to keep an organization afloat. We can’t let our families down, those new faces, so raw with grief can’t be ignored. We have to raise enough money to keep talking in Washington, and to keep supporting the people who are affected by these crashes.
We need your help.
Next spring we’ll be inviting families to Washington, to give them and their loved ones a voice on Capitol Hill. It’s a conference called Sorrow to Strength which we do every other year. The families, particularly the new families, come to the conference filled with sorrow, and through their time together with other families who have gone through similar experiences, they learn more about the issues, and about themselves.
We see people come the first day barely able to speak their story, who leave after four days with new confidence, strength and commitment, people who have found their voices.
We are all stronger than we ever thought we could be.
We need money to be able to do that. If you’re interested, there are a number of scholarships that need funding. Every dollar helps. You can learn more about the conference and the specific needs at our website, trucksafety.org, under the tab “Sorrow to Strength.”
And, at an every day level, we need funds to have someone answer the phone when a new family calls for help.
We need funds to attend meetings with the agencies that make the rules that govern the trucking industry, to make certain that safety is always involved in any decision.
We need funds for someone to reach out to families soon after the crash, to make sure they know we’re here.
There are so many things that need to be done to meet our duel mission of supporting families and affecting change. And they all require funding.
Truck Safety affects everyone. We all share the roads with commercial trucks. We are all at risk. Help us keep educating, keep supporting, keep pushing for change.
Please donate. You’ll find my page on Facebook or you can go to the Truck Safety Coalition Facebook page and donate there.
And if YOU or your family or friends have been in a crash with a commercial truck, and you’d like to join us in our work, or you want some advice, or just need to connect with other people with a similar experience, please contact us.
You can find out more about our organization and how to reach us at trucksafety.org.
If you knew my dad you know he wouldn’t have been quiet if one of his kids had been killed that December morning.
I can’t be quiet either.
I would be grateful if you would find it in your heart to donate so we can continue this important work.
Here it is Friday already and I haven’t been back to thank so many of you for your support of my Giving Tuesday Facebook fundraiser.
As you may remember I was raising funds for CRASH (Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways) which is a 501c3 under the umbrella of the Truck Safety Coalition (TSC). I’m a volunteer with them, and have been since dad was killed December 23, 2004 by a tired semi driver who failed to see traffic stopped ahead of him.
Anyway, giving Tuesday is a way for people to easily donate to nonprofits and many of you donated to mine, and I can’t thank you enough.
This year we had two anonymous donors each willing to match the first $10,000 we raised, so it was very important that collectively we get to that magic mark, and we did! We actually raised about $13,000, so all in all the organizations, between CRASH and P.A.T.T (Parents Against Tired Trucking, the other organization under the TSC umbrella) raised $33,000.
This is much more than we’ve ever been able to raise on this platform before, and that’s due to our First Reponse Coordinator getting behind the effort, organizing us and cheering us on. Next year we hope to have even more volunteers put up their own fundraiser on Giving Tuesday so that we can raise even more.
By maintaining our fundraisers, talking about them throughout the day (I even did a live interview), changing the images at the top, sharing it often, we not only kept ourselves front and center, but we reenergized our donor base and our volunteers.
Now we’re ready to start work — there is much to be done, and with your help we’ll be able to move forward, helping more people, one family at a time. If you weren’t able to help, that’s OK, I appreciate your emotional support as much as your monetary support. I know you guys have my back and that counts more than you can ever know.
Change Is Hard 