I have followed your web site and have read many of your threads regarding various types of termination. I live and work in Kansas which is an at will state so I do understand that an employer / employee can terminate employment at any time.
I worked for a concrete company driving a mixer truck. On my last day of employment, the truck I was driving broke down and I was given a brand new truck to drive. This new truck happened to have a fiberglass drum instead of the standard metal drum which mixes the concrete until it is completely discharged. I was given no instruction on use and care of the new truck when it was given to me to drive. I basiclly jumped out of one truck into the new one and continued to deliver concrete.
That evening when the last delivery was made and as standard procedure, I was loaded with rock to clean any excess concrete out of the drum and discharged it in the appropriate area. When I came to work the next morning, the truck acted as though there was concrete still left in the drum. I looked in and there was a pile of concrete that had " set up"
in the front of the drum. I went to my supervisor and mentioned this to him and he told me to rotate the drum so the concrete that had set up was at the top of the drum and drive around to see if it couldn't be dislodged. I did this and it did not work. I went back to my supervisor and told him that the concrete was still in the drum and hadn't dislodged. He then told me to have the drum filled with hot water from the batchman and rotate the drum as fast as it would go and then discharge it. I did what he had suggested and while I was discharging the material from the truck, a large section of the concrete became dislodged and rouined the drum of the truck. Basiclly cracked it like an egg. A few days later, I was fired for tearing up a brand new truck.
Some of the facts as I know them are:
1. I had no instruction on the use and care of the new truck before use.
2. Trucks that have fiberglass drums need to be washed out with water
and not rock.
3. Had I washed the truck out with water instead of rock, there
wouldn't have been concrete left in the truck to set up.
4. The mixer drum wasn't damaged until I followed the instructions of
my supervisor.
Subsequently I was discharged for damaging the new truck. Would anyone be able to help me decide if this would fall under wrongful discharge or not, and would there be any recourse that could be taken against the company ?

