Gordon Pearce - Wheres Sharawrah?: A Truck Drivers Adventure across the Arabian Desert

A Truck Drivers Adventure
across the Arabian Desert

A Truck Drivers Adventure
across the Arabian Desert

Gordon Pearce

Thank you to Laura McConochie for her computer skills, Tessa Cheek for her literary skills and Ashley Coghill for all your help.

5th wheel A large fixed plate on the rear of an Artic unit that the trailer can hook on to

A frame The connection of a rigid truck to a trailer

Artic Articulated vehicle

Bottom out When a low loader gets stuck on a humpback bridge

Chai Tea with no milk

Clicks Kilometres

D8 bulldozer A very large-tracked bulldozer with a 12 blade

Dolly Axle with 5th wheel and A frame to go under a trailer

Dolly knot A special knot on a rope to increase pulling power or to hold loads

Flip flop Open sandals held on by the strap between big toe and next toe

Jacknife When the trailer skids round and hits the truck

psi Pounds per square inch

Souk Marketplace in the Middle East

Suzies Air pipes and electrical cable connecting truck to trailer, for brakes and lights

Tilts Canvas cover over a metal and wood framework on a trailer

Trailer pin A very strong 2 metal pin under the front of the trailer to hook on to the 5th wheel of the tractor unit

Wadi A dry river bed

T hese three buttons on the dash engage the three diff-locks; here are the keys.

The White Trux transport manager and I were in the cab of a Mercedes 2632 articulated vehicle that I was to drive at the start of a new job in Saudi Arabia. That was it! He then got out of the cab and made his way back to the office, saying over his shoulder, Dont forget to give it a thorough service and check all the oil levels.

This was my first day in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. It was midday in the middle of summer. The sun was blazing down and it felt like being in an oven. With no shade anywhere, I just wilted, unable to think clearly or do anything.

What on earth am I doing here, I thought. Now what have I let myself in for?

The day before arriving in Jeddah I had been at my home in Maidstone, Kent, enjoying a very pleasant sunny day in June. A couple of weeks before, I had read an advertisement in the local paper asking for lorry drivers to work in Saudi Arabia. The job sounded interesting three months working in Saudi then one month off at home. It was summer 1978 and with the pay at 150 a week plus trip money, and tax free, this promised to reward me much more than my present job. So I phoned the company, White Trux, and was given a time and day for an interview.

I arrived on time to meet Mr. Michael White, the managing director, in his transport yard office near Canterbury. At the interview I was asked what driving experience I had, and my clean HGV One driving license was checked.

I told Mr. White of my three years in the Army with the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers as a recovery mechanic driving a Scammel recovery truck, or sometimes a Diamond T tank transporter. One of these towing a 32-wheeled trailer loaded with a 72 ton Conquer tank would have a gross weight of 120 tons. The Diamond T only did a maximum of 25mph, and the 24 gears with two gear sticks made it tricky to drive, when fully loaded.

I left the Army aged 21 and in 1959 joined National Benzole delivering fuel to garages in South East London and Kent. In that job I drove all makes of road tanker from small Dennis four wheelers up to their biggest, a 28 ton Leyland or an AEC eight wheelers. I left National Benzole when they moved too far away to Northfleet, and after that worked for three years as an insurance agent. My father had an insurance brokerage business, and hoped I would carry on in the firm. However office work was not for me, I liked the open road.

Then I heard of a job with Asian Transport. Bob Paul took me on as their first driver in a brand new AEC Mark 5 Mammoth Major and trailer. I did seven years from 1966 to 1973 with Astran, as they were renamed, driving mostly to Tehran in Iran. In 1970, I was the first English driver in a Scania 110 to take a load to Doha, Qatar. The truck and trailer had a full load of telephone equipment, cables, crates and plastic ducting tubes. At that time Qatar had no telephones at all. The first delivery by ship had taken two months and most of the delivery was so badly damaged it was unusable. My trip took only two weeks and there was no damage at all. I was rather proud of that achievement.

Five years of European work followed after I left Astran, but the pull was there to go back to the Middle East again. I was very pleased to be getting the job with White Trux. I next had to arrange to get a visa and a work permit for Saudi Arabia. Then I had to have the necessary injections before leaving. When that was all done I was given a one-way airline ticket. Before I knew it, I was on an uneventful flight to Jeddah. At Jeddah airport I was met by a White Trux driver and driven in a jeep to their villa. This was situated on the outskirts of town, about three kilometres from the centre where the shops and marketplace were. Within an hour of arriving at the villa to say hello to everyone I was taken outside and shown this big 6 x 6 Mercedes truck. The midday sun blazed down, and I roasted in my long trousers and shirt. It was so hot.

As I had a look round the Mercedes, the first things to stand out were the big sand tyres which made the whole truck look bigger and much higher off the ground. There was only a day cab to live in on long trips, but the cab was over six foot wide with a bench seat on the passenger side. This was sufficient to sleep across if you moved the gear stick. The radio cassette player worked well, which was to prove a godsend.

White Trux desert Merc in local paper

Behind the cab was a full width storage box giving lots of room for straps, ropes, jack and tools etc. On top of that was a 150 litre fuel tank so giving 450 litres total with the main fuel tank. All in all, the truck was longer than the average articulated unit and certainly a good tool for the job.

I found a grease gun in the mechanics store and made a start with greasing the steering, prop shaft and any other grease nipples I could find. Any metal was too hot to touch, so I needed gloves. At least underneath the truck I had a little shade. Within a couple of minutes I needed a break, but every time I stopped to sit by a wall, just as in the Army, there would be a shout.

Oi, Pearce, get on with it!

In the relentless sun I wished I had a hat and, being fair skinned, I wanted to avoid getting sunburn. It did not take too long to check the oil and water and to add distilled water to top up the big batteries. Lastly I smeared grease on the 5th wheel and she was ready for the road.