I was thinking about David today when I thought about something that happened to me this summer.
We relocated from TN to PA in July. We had our cattle moved commercially, but I hauled our horses and cats up in our living quarters horse trailer. I left our farm in TN at 6 p.m. to avoid both heat and traffic.
I needed diesel around 12:30 p.m., and got off the interstate at an exit in the middle of nowhere. There were two gas stations, not truck stops, there. The stores themselves were closed, but the pumps were open for credit card purchases. Each had four sets of pumps, two sets on each island.
I pulled into one and filled up. I did a walk around of the truck and trailer, and heard a hissing noise from my front passenger's side tire, and it went down quickly. I got in the truck and called for roadside assistance, then called my husband who was 5 hours behind me.
Roadside assistance got a hold of a contract wrecker company and called me back to let me know it would be 45 minutes to an hour until he could get to me. I decided to just stay put, and not move my truck and trailer with the flat tire, because there was still another diesel pump available if someone else pulled in and plenty of light where I sat.
I watered my horses, used the restroom in my trailer and got back in the truck to sit and wait for the wrecker. In the meantime a small beat up car with two younger men pulls into the pump opposite me on the other side, and no one gets out. And no one gets out. And no one gets out. Finally the driver gets out, walks to the pump but doesn't fuel. He then walks back to the other set of pumps on that side. But again, no pumping gas.
My wrecker driver pulls in and notices the car immediately and asks what the deal is. I tell him, and also tell him I will stand and watch them while he changes the tire. After he finishes changing my tire and we are doing the paperwork, the two men in the car pull out, and cross the road to the gas station across the street, and the entire process starts over.
Both the wrecker driver and I thought they were trying to put skimmers on the credit card readers on the pumps. They couldn't tell from where they were parked from me if I was alone or had someone else with me, so probably did not approach me because of that.
Could David have had something similar happen to him, but it went horribly wrong? Most truckers use fleet cards at truck stops, but some in the near recent past have started taking credit cards so you no longer have to walk in to the cashier. I am assuming credit cards could be skimmed at truck stop fueling stations, although fleet cards are harder to skim because they require mileage entries and sometimes a PIN number.