Truck drivers have an on-the-job injury risk that's about three times that of employees in other industries. Roadway accidents account for 25% of driver injuries due to the risks of other drivers, bad weather, and unsafe road conditions. Yet many trucking injuries occur when the truck is standing still and the driver isn’t even behind the wheel. The most common injuries are slips, trips and falls; or struck with shifting freight or moving equipment like forklifts. 8% of trucking injuries that result in worker's compensation claims are related to tarping loads on flatbeds.
Tarping is both an art and an ordeal.
Since it's required for much of the freight hauled by a flatbed, most experienced drivers refine their own creative tarping techniques to get the job done as efficiently as possible. Still tarping is, and always has been, an arduous and even dangerous job that most drivers—and their managers—learn to dread. The challenge of tarping is, in fact, why experienced flatbed drivers typically command higher pay than their colleagues in pulling dry-vans where the process isn't required. They earn it.
