Garbage truck driver, Thomas Guzzardo killed by his own truck

FROM THE DAILY NEWS 

The Brooklyn driver crushed to death by a runaway garbage truck complained just a week ago that his troublesome rig was lurching out of gear, heartbroken relatives said Friday.

Thomas Guzzardo, a 52-year-old driver for Chambers Paper Fibers, told family members his truck started hurtling down the street on Nov. 28 after it inexplicably came out of park, forcing him to jump into the rig’s cab to stop it.

“This is something that happened last week, and now it’s happened again and it killed him,” Guzzardo’s wife, Mary Guzzardo, said as she choked back tears inside the family’s Bath Beach home.

Speaking through sobs, Thomas Guzzardo’s daughter, Jennifer Guzzardo, said the privately owned sanitation company had to know the truck that killed her father was defective.

“A guy from his job said nobody wanted to drive that truck because they knew it had problems,” Jennifer Guzzardo, 25, said. “I guess they don’t care. They’re just worried about making their own money.”

Representatives for Chambers Paper Fibers did not return repeated calls for comment.

Cops say Thomas Guzzardo somehow put the 1997 Mack truck into drive before he hopped out to collect some garbage along his route in Bedford-Stuyvesant on Thursday.

As the vehicle bore down on a row of parked cars, he raced to catch up with the rampaging rig but ended up pinned against one of the cars, police said.

Mary Guzzardo, 53, questioned the cops’ account, pointing to her beloved husband’s flawless safety record throughout his 26-year career as a driver.

“He knew those trucks like the back of his hand,” she said. “It just doesn’t make sense how this happened.”

Relatives said they weren’t at all surprised Thomas Guzzardo, a father of three and grandfather of six, risked his life to save his truck.

“He was all for the company,” Mary Guzzardo said. “He wanted to save them money.”

A steady stream of friends and relatives poured into the Guzzardo home Friday, paying tribute to a man described as a doting father and grandfather who never said no to his family.

“He was a prince,” Jennifer Guzzardo said. “[My parents] were broke, but whatever we wanted, he gave to us.”

In recent years, Thomas Guzzardo often complained about his job but refused to leave the company he joined 11 years ago.

“I told him to look for another job,” his widow said. “But he’s the type that’s faithful. He’s there to the end.”