All HAIL breaks loose

We got up early at Gary, got our trailer and hit the road. No problems. This week is going too smooth. We were "fortunate" to have a hazmat load this time headed to Salt Lake. I had a funny feeling about it as well, and took a little more time on the preflight insp. than normal. When we crossed over the Ill/Iowa border, I kinda figured we'd get pulled in at that weigh station for some check of paperwork, etc. When we have a hazmat load, we are required to go enter the weigh station if open. Usually, we just get run across the scales and on our way. Once in awhile, they tell us to park and bring in the paperwork on the truck, bills of lading (bol's), etc. We have had no problem yet with this, just a little time consuming. Well, the first scale house we hit was normal, across the scale and on our way. The next one we hit was as we approached Des Moines. Across the scale, then "pull in and park, bring in the registrations, BOL's, license, medical card, etc." UH OH! I parked and took everything in. The inspector looked at everything, and even ran my name/license # thru the system to make sure I was ok and no fake license. (Do I look THAT dumb?). After that, he said lets go look at the truck and trailer. He looked, and looked, and looked. Under the hood, under the chassis, at the brakes, all the lites, horn, wipers, etc. He even marked the rod on the brake canisters, then had me depress the brake pedal to see if they moved far enough for proper operation on ALL wheels. After all that, he told me to grab my log book and come on back in.
He went thru my logs, and filled out some paperwork on the computer, had me sign, and told me good job. I just had my first LEVEL 1 inspection by DOT and did not get any violations. WHEW! I've heard about these inspections, but so far had avoided it. Guess it was my turn. Just glad it all went well.
OK, that down, the rest of the trip should be a piece of cake, right? Not so fast pilgrim!
Seems as Mother Nature had her own ideas of keeping my day interesting. We got on over toward Kearney, Neb, and heard of severe thunderstorm warnings, and tornado watches. The sky kept getting darker, then started to rain some. Next came a little hail. Then ALOT of HAIL and rain! All of a sudden I could not see past the hood of the truck. It was raining so hard and hailing, I couldn't hear Kim either. It looked like we were underwater, it was a weird aqua-greyish green out. I knew we were in trouble when I saw leaves and twigs hitting my windshield! Kim said they were spinning around. I just started shutting it down to pull over and just in time, Kim pointed out a truck camper stopped RIGHT in front of me. I swerved around him, and pulled over on the shoulder as FAR as I could behind some other cars and trucks. A couple minutes later, it lightened up where we could see a little, and we started on down the road slowly, still barely able to see the next car. It kept getting lighter, and we kept on down the road, as fast as our little truck would carry us! About 30 mi later, it was all clear, sunny, etc, and weather the rest of the way to SLC was not an issue.
WHEW, I have NEVER been in anything like that on the road, and hope not to again!
We got into SLC about 4am, dropped and reloaded, and rolled out. Now we are headed back to Aurora. I think we'll shut down again for the nite just east of Council Bluffs then hit Aurora sometime late morning.
Hopefully Mother Nature will figure she got our attention and leave us alone for the rest of the trip. And we also got a nice little sticker on our windshield from the DOT that I assume tells them we have had a Level 1 inspection recently, so hopefully they won't bother us either.
Here's to hoping anyway!
Till next time, keep it safe out there. (Right Dad? No more autocrossing with RV's!) :)