Five Good Things: More accomplished women, Highway Angels

March has quickly come and gone, and March Madness ends as well on April 2 and April 3 with the crowning of new men's and women's college basketball national champions. But hold up, not before we celebrate some champions of trucking, including many leading women and some genuine heroes of the road, in this week's Five Good Things.

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WIT names Woman in Logistics Award finalists

The Women In Trucking Association (WIT) has three finalists for its 2023 Distinguished Woman in Logistics Award, or DWLA.

Sponsored by the Transportation Intermediaries Association (TIA) and load-board operator Truckstop, the DWLAs laud the achievements of women employed in North American transportation.

This year’s DWLA finalists are: Katerina Jones, chief marketing officer for Fleet Advantage; Nanette Malebranche, managing director of the Tri-State District for FedEx Express; and Erin Van Zeeland, who is senior VP and general manager of logistics for Schneider.

According to a release from WIT, the finalists have demonstrated exceptional leadership within their companies as well as with other professional, educational, or altruistic organizations. The winner of the 2023 award will be announced during TIA’s Capital Ideas Conference and Exhibition on April 21.

Katerina Jones

Jones is an executive with more than 20 years of client-centric, data-driven, and integrated marketing experience. She helps onboard clients, including top for-hire and private fleets. Jones is credited for building Fleet Advantage’s brand through consistent educational messaging, giving the business a leading voice in the industry. As a member of Fleet Advantage’s senior leadership, she provides counsel on critical business matters, including operations, business strategy, human resources, internal processes, diversity, company culture, and community and industry relations.

Jones is seen as a leader and mentor for other women in the industry and has won several awards and speaking engagements, including the Top Women to Watch in Transportation by WIT and Top Female Professional by the Supply & Demand Chain Executive. In addition to her industry expertise, Jones also is involved in several charitable organizations, industry-related council positions, and committees.

Nanette Malebranche

Malebranche is a leader whose professional background in the transportation and logistics industry exceeds 35 years. Before joining FedEx Express in 1987, she was VP of Island Couriers.

She is a proponent of the Quality Driven Management process at FedEx. Her district is frequently used as a test market as she is a pioneer of progress, according to WIT. Many initiatives she championed garnered a multitude of awards and acclaim.

Malebranche directed several projects to empower future leaders, including her role as a regional people lead, in which she helped provide direction and coaching to the regional teams. She inspires growth opportunities and support to frontline employees through proper planning and scheduled activities. She also is the creator and collaborator of a FedEx publication, “It Starts with Me,” and participates in many community-service and volunteer efforts.

She has won several awards, including the March of Dimes Annual Women of Distinction Award, and is a six-time recipient of the FedEx CEO Five Star Award. She also serves as the board president for the Hispanic Counseling Center and Junior Achievement of New York.

Erin Van Zeeland

In Van Zeeland’s position at Schneider, a provider of transportation, intermodal, and logistics services, she’s accountable for the strategy, execution, and growth/profitability of the company's fastest-growing segment, including brokerage, supply chain, and distribution management and the power only service offerings. Van Zeeland also is Schneider’s chief commercial officer. In this capacity she is responsible for the commercial strategy and the development of the organization, which includes activities related to marketing, sales, sales force effectiveness, product development, and service that drives business growth and expanded market share.

Van Zeeland was the recipient of Supply & Demand Chain Executive’s first-ever Women in Supply Chain Award. She serves on the board of directors for the United Way-Green Bay and co-leads the Schneider Women’s Network and various other women in leadership and business programs.

ABF driver named Highway Angel for aiding elderly motorist

Truck driver Travis Braun on March 8 stopped in the middle of the night to help a disoriented elderly man who had crashed his pickup into a concrete median—and for that act of bravery and service to others Braun’s been named a Highway Angel by the Truckload Carriers Association (TCA).

Around 2:30 a.m. that night, Braun was traveling on Interstate 44 in Vinita, Oklahoma, when in front of him the pickup, which was pulling a trailer, pulled toward the side of the road and seemed to be trying to make a U-turn. The pickup, however, ended up crashing into a concrete median barrier, according to a TCA release.

“It blocked the entire interstate,” said Braun, who drives for ABF Freight (part of the company family of ArcBest, which ranks No. 29 on the FleetOwner 500 for-hire list) and lives in Grain Valley, Missouri.

The professional driver pulled over and ran to the crashed vehicle to see if the pickup’s driver was injured. The man, who appeared to be in his mid-70s, told him he was shaken up and seemed to be disoriented. Braun called 911 and stayed on the scene until the emergency responders arrived.

The first responders and police wanted the driver to move his crashed vehicle, but he could not comprehend the instructions, so Braun received permission from law enforcement on the scene to move the vehicle and he parked it across the road.

“I just felt like it was the right thing to do,” he said.

Since the TCA program began in August 1997, nearly 1,300 professional truck drivers have been recognized as Highway Angels for kindness, courtesy, and courage displayed while doing their jobs. The program’s presenting sponsor is EpicVue and its supporting sponsor is DriverFacts.

XPO honors additional drivers for accident-free miles

XPO, a provider of less-than-truckload (LTL) freight transportation and No. 12 on the 2023 FleetOwner 500 for-hire list, announced that 254 of its professional truck drivers reached new safety milestones in 2022: achieving 1 million, 2 million, or 3 million miles of accident-free driving. Collectively, these drivers have covered more than 318 million accident-free miles over their careers.

“I want to congratulate the 254 drivers who reached this impressive milestone in 2022,” said Mario Harik, XPO’s CEO. “They join more than 2,000 other distinguished million-mile drivers at XPO and are an inspiration to our entire organization. I’m grateful for their achievements and proud of each of our 22,000 drivers, mechanics, dockworkers, and other North American employees for their shared commitment to safety.”

It typically takes about nine years and nearly 20,000 hours of service for LTL drivers to reach 1 million miles—the equivalent of 40 trips around the Earth. In 2022, David Frazier became the first XPO driver to surpass a landmark 4 million accident-free miles—the best driver safety record in the company’s history.

XPO moves customers’ freight through one of the largest LTL networks in North America, with 294 terminals and about 13,000 professional drivers covering 99% of U.S. zip codes as well as Canada and Mexico. The company’s integrated network operations are supported by proprietary technology that is focused on enhancing operational quality and delivering strong customer service.

Professional drivers talk highway safety with high schoolers

This week, American Trucking Associations’ Share the Road program teamed up with the Indiana Motor Truck Association and Save A Life Tour to visit four high schools across Indiana to educate students about safe driving techniques around trucks.

Share the Road is a highway safety program in which million-mile accident-free professional truck drivers deliver lifesaving safety tips to the public, media, and public officials through television, radio, the web, and in print. The program's goal is to reach as many people as possible and change driving behavior to save lives.

Driver aids motorist run over by his own U-Haul

Truckers drive their rigs so hard and for so long that before too long they come upon some unusual occurrences. That’s usually when the hero comes out in them, as was the case with Ron Allen, who stopped to help a man who had been run over by his own U-Haul.

Allen, who drives for Maverick Transportation (No. 84 on the FleetOwner 500 for-hire list) out of Little Rock, Arkansas, and is from Stone Gap, Virginia, was moving through Morristown, Tennessee, before dawn on Dec. 10 at about 5:30 a.m. when he saw the U-Haul truck, which looked as if it was coming straight at him traveling the wrong way on the road.

“The lights were coming toward me,” he said.

As he got closer, Allen confirmed it was a U-Haul, which actually was rolling across the road, according to the Truckload Carriers Association (TCA), which this month named Allen as a Highway Angel. “It went across the road into the median and got stuck there,” he said. “It happened right in front of me.”

Allen got on the shoulder to allow another truck next to him to get over and avoid the U-Haul, and while pulling over, he saw a man on the ground, almost in the lane, holding his leg, a release from TCA said. Allen and another motorist stopped to check on the man, and as the other motorist dialed 911, Allen got in the U-Haul, which was now wrecked in the woods, and put the box rental truck in park.

Allen said the injured man told him he thought he put the midsize truck in park after stopping on the side of the road, but actually the U-Haul was set to reverse. When the U-Haul driver exited his truck, he rolled his ankle on the rumble strip on the road, and at that point, the door pushed him down and the U-Haul ran over his leg.

Allen grabbed the injured man’s cellphone and jacket from the crashed U-Haul, brought both to him, and helped him put his coat on. The injured man had a compound leg fracture and his bone had punctured his skin, according to the TCA release, and Allen waited until emergency personnel arrived at the scene.