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The Fishing Truck, Let’s Lighten Things Up a Bit by Melvin Fuller, Melvin Fuller Well Drilling Several years ago my son Adam and I had something very interesting and unusual happen to us which became known as the “fishing truck” experience. Adam and I were at a pond filling a 1000-gallon water tank, mounted on a one-ton Chevrolet flatbed truck. The truck was in gear, but as the tank began to fill, the extra weight popped the transmission out of gear and the truck began to roll backward toward the pond. Then, according to Murphy’s law, the truck rolled over a practically new ditch pump and tore the discharge hose off the back of the water tank as it proceeded, faster and faster, toward the pond. Since the tank was almost empty, when the truck went into the pond, it floated. As water began to fill the tank through the inlet where the hose had broken off, slowly but surely, the truck sank. Adam swam out to the sunken truck and stood on the top of the cab; the water came up to his waist. Since we had previously drilled a well for the next-door neighbor, who had been watching these proceedings with much interest and amaze- ment, he kindly offered to drive us to the drilling rig. We pulled the drill pipe out of the borehole, rigged down, and took the rig over to the pond. After about three unsuccessful dives, Adam finally got the cable from the rig hooked to the bumper of the water truck. When the truck came out of the pond, fish were flopping around on the sides of the tank and a BUNCH were already inside the cab - plenty to have a fish fry. I was really amazed at how quickly the fish got into the truck! So, if any of you drill operators are fishermen and looking for a new fishing method, and have an old truck or car you don’t especially care for, you might give this way a try. (It would probably work even better if you put some bait inside - old rotten corn works well.) After draining the water out of the engine, transmission, and rear end, plus a minor tune-up, the old “fishing” truck was back on the road again. Later when Adam was in college, he wrote an essay on this incident and asked his older sister, an English major, to check it before he turned it in. After reading the essay, she asked, “How did you ever dream up all this stuff?” He told her, “I didn’t have to. That’s what really happened.” He got an “A” on the essay. Later, in another English class, he submitted it, and once again got an “A”. Since this fish story is backed by three eye witnesses, it cannot be classified with “hunters’ and fishermen tales”. Training August 3-7 ~ Phoenix, AZ August 4-6 ~ Jacksonville, FL August 10-14 ~ Reno, NV August 17-21 ~ Houston, TX August 18-20 ~ Tampa, FL August 24-28 ~ Fresno, CA August 25-27 ~ Sacramento, CA August 31-Sept. 4 ~ Tuscaloosa, AL phone: 800-498-1942 www.rainbirdservices.com More education opportunities during events can be found online at worldwidedrillingresource.com 17 WorldWide Drilling Resource ® JULY 2020 Foundations by: Deep Foundations Institute S3: Slopes, Slides and Stabilization August 5 ~ VIRTUAL EVENT phone: 973-423-4030 www.dfi.org by: American Society of Civil Engineers Deep Foundations: Design, Construction, and Quality Control August 6-7 ~ Boston, MA phone: 703-295-6300 www.asce.org Groundwater / Water Well by: American Ground Water Trust Georgia PFAS (per- & polyfluoroalkyl substances) Webinar August 10 ~ ONLINE WEBINAR phone: 603-228-5444 www.agwt.org Irrigation by: Rain Bird Academy Education Connection Adam, now a father himself, and Mel will never forget the experience. Melvin Fuller Well Drilling is small, family- owned business in its fourth generation of servicing the water well industry. WTR