A day in the life of a truck driver …

TRUCK DRIVERS often pick up more flak than cargo in a profession not respected as a profession. The skilled driver shortage puts inexperienced drivers behind the wheel and truckers all round in front of the finger at accident scenes. FTW's Mark Jackson-Moss rides shotgun with Cedric Seroba from Concord Logistics for a closer look. 05h00 Cedric boards a train from Tembisa to City Deep. After looking through the first deliveryorder for the day over a cup of coffee, Cedric spends twenty minutes on the pre-trip inspection of the triaxle he will drive that day. 08h25 Arriving at the Grindrod Container depot in City Deep, Cedric hands in his order for the box hiding beyond the entry gate. Ten minutes later, he drives through well-formed potholes filled with water to the back of the queue. Cedric waits his turn for the only operations stacker-crane to load his box. “You can’t go to them when you are waiting. They will tell you they know their job. It doesn’t make them go any faster,” Cedric says. The truck behind us almost falls over trying to join the queue as it turns through a pothole. “That was close. His whole side was off the ground.” 09h20 Cedric leaves the depot for his client in Alberton North. “I have always liked driving. I get to see many places, but when the truck is not moving, it can be very boring.” 10h20 Arriving at the client, Cedric goes off to find the receiving manager. It takes twenty minutes for the client’s staff to finish their morning tea before the seals are broken and the forklift is brought round. It takes an hour to unload all of the1 tonne bags from the twenty foot container, in which time Cedric has checked the condition of his tyres, and returned from buying a cold drink from the nearby Spar. 11h50 The empty container is dropped off at the depot. “Today was a good day. We didn’t have to wait too long at the depots, and traffic was not so bad. I will get in one more delivery before the depots close at 4 o’clock,” says Cedric. “In this business, you have to be quick, but you also have to take your time. Be quick where you can be, and slow around corners. If you have an accident, it won’t matter how quick you were. “Many younger people who start out driving bakkies or four tonners see heavy truck driving as their next step,” says Cedric. “But then you have to go cross-border, which means a month away from the family. I get home at eight-thirty, and I already don’t see very much of my children. It’s not easy on them. “Cars also need to realise that a truck is a heavy vehicle, and it needs a lot of time to stop. A lot of accidents are caused by trucks trying to prevent an accident,” says Cedric. “We have lives and families, this job is too important to lose. There is always pressure to deliver, but time is not with us most days because the roads make us drive slowly. We do what we can to get the cargo there, and time becomes number two.”