B737-800
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Situational Awareness; Communication Breakdown; Distraction
Conflict Ground Conflict; Critical; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
Flight Crew Took Evasive Action
Airport; Environment - Non Weather Related; Procedure; Human Factors
Taxiing into gate; we could have hit the fuel cart because it was in the wrong box. Night time. Raining. Late night. When we got closer [the ground personnel] said 40 feet to go but First Officer said 'Stop!' First Officer shouted out window for crew to move fueling cart. Very hard to see the lines due to rain but it was in a box. Cart was moved to the proper box and we taxied to the gate. I went down on the ramp to talk to the ground personnel and fueler. Fueler said ground crew put fuel cart in wrong box (yes there were two boxes). Ground crew apologized. If I didn't have a very good and very forceful First Officer; there's a good chance I could have hit the fuel cart. Excellent job First Officer! Only have one painted box for fuel carts; not two.
An aircraft was being guided into its gate when the First Officer noticed a fuel cart was parked in the wrong spot in the path of the aircraft.