While most Americans were soundly asleep on Sunday morning, Oct. 28, an emergency team for Baylor Trucking came to the company’s office in Milan, Ind., to begin preparations for Hurricane Sandy. The superstorm was moving toward the Atlantic coast and was set to make landfall near Atlantic City, N.J., the evening of Oct. 30.
When the team arrived, Baylor had 56 trucks in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
The next day, 20 drivers were still in the storm’s path. The goal was to move them out by 2:00 PM, hours before Sandy was scheduled to arrive that evening.
“It was an all-out scramble,” says Cari Baylor, director of sales and information technology. When the storm hit Tuesday evening, five drivers remained in the area due to road closures. The emergency team was at least able to ensure all drivers were parked in safe areas.
“It was a group effort with the teamwork here, the technology, and the drivers,” Baylor says.
Some carriers located in this region had to relocate more than just drivers. Price-Tran’s central dispatch office in Allentown, Penn., lost electricity, Internet and phone service when the storm passed through. Allentown is located 80 miles inland from the Jersey shore.
“We were basically shut down for two days and lost significant revenue in what would otherwise have been a great month with 23 operating days in October,” says Dave Ward, president of the dry-van carrier with 16 trucks.
