DRIVER STORY * USA - The life of a long-haul trucker

“If you bought it, truckers brought it,” is the motto for long-haul truckers...

Johnson Lane,NV,USA -The Record Courier, by Lisa Welch -9 July 2008: -- ... like Bernie Wilkinson, a Johnson Lane resident and trucker for the Craig Scheckla Co. based in Sheridan, Wyo... Bernie has been driving big trucks for 14 years now. Bernie’s wife Jenice is a bank service manager in Gardnerville and his son Britain is a third-grader at Piñon Hills Elementary School. Jenice and Britain hold down the fort 12 days out of 14 while Bernie hauls loads in Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, the Dakotas, Canada and Alaska. He mostly hauls cement bags, drilling fluids and squared logs called cants. It’s a busy life, all right... Bernie drives a 2007 Kenworth W900 with an 18-speed auto shift. It has six cylinders, with 475 horsepower and 1,650 foot pound torque. He typically drives about 150,000 miles per year with a 40-foot front trailer and a 28-foot rear trailer connected in what is known as a Super B Train... It has eight axles and 30 tires and can haul more than 70,000 pound loads for a gross weight of nearly 110,000 pounds. This is a lot of technical stuff, isn’t it?... This past year Bernie made many 7,000 mile round trips, delivering 68,000 to 70,000 pound loads of bentonite (drilling mud for water wells and oil fields) to Fairbanks, Anchorage and Kenai, Alaska... (Photo Special to The R-C -- Johnson Lane resident and long-haul trucker Bernie Wilkinson has been driving big trucks for 14 years)