More Unintended Consequences

I have an incident to report to you that occurred on our recent road trip.  In fact, we wouldn’t have witnessed it had I not left that Kindle reader at the gas station in Rawlins, Wyoming. 

On our return to Rawlins we decided to top up the tank again for the trip over to Salt Lake City.  When we pulled in to the station there was a young lady there pumping gas at another pump. Unbeknownst to us, she was a novice at pumping her own gas and it was critical to the event that transpired.

There are only two states that I know for certain do not allow customers to pump their own gasoline, Oregon and New Jersey. You may know of others, but those two are the only ones I can attest to. The reason is probably altruistic, in that it allows for the employment of hundreds, if not thousands, of attendants to service vehicles at the pump.

However, there are consequences when the citizens of those states travel to other states that don’t have those restrictions and where they must pump their own gasoline.

The girl who was pumping gas was from Oregon.  She must have pumped her own gas somewhere prior to her purchase at Rawlins, but was apparently still learning how to do it.  That became a problem very quickly.

The woman pulled the gas handle out of her fill pipe while still depressing the trigger, because when it came out it was spewing gasoline.  She got quite a bit on herself and had to go into the restroom to wash up and (I hope) change her dress. Meanwhile, the station manager took a bucket of water with some kind of additive to soak up the spill,

My wife used the restroom after the girl had departed and she said it smelled strongly of gasoline.  That poor woman was embarrassed and probably frightened half to death by the experience. How easy it would have been for her to immolated herself with an errant spark or other ignition source!

It occurs to me that the ban on self-service in states like Oregon and New Jersey is not conducive to safety.  People who do not have the opportunity to learn how to pump gas are at extreme disadvantage and danger when they find themselves in a state where there is no attendant to pump for you.  Maybe it keeps more people employed, but it has unintended consequences for travelers who live in those states.

The incident I witnessed and described could very easily have resulted in a fatality and possibly other casualties, myself and my wife included.  That would have been especially true if she were the type of ignorant person who uses a cell phone while pumping gas.