Truck Driving Duo Clock 1 Million KMs

It would be fair to say, there’s no team quite like Allied Bulk’s cement tanker drivers Bernie Halford and Graeme Mcilraith. With over 80 years of combined experience in the heavy transport industry, and a whopping 18 years of working together, the duo started their career with HWR at Southern Transport before making the move across to ABL. In 2019, Bernie and Graeme did their first load in a new Mack Trident. Fast forward four years and four months, they managed to clock up over 1 million kilometres – a milestone that’s certainly worthy of the company hall of fame list. Delivering cement all over Otago and Southland, with the odd venture into Canterbury, that 1 million kilometre figure, on average, worked out to a not-so-small 19,000kms per month and 230,000kms per year. You might be wondering how they managed to hit a number of this magnitude. The answer? Plenty of double shifts, a career driving too many trucks to remember, and a working friendship like no other. While they both admit to having a bit of a fiery temper at times, all it’s taken is some good communication, respect for one another, a whole lot of trust and a day to clear the air – quite the recipe for a pair of people who spend the majority of their time sharing the same workspace. Self-described “24/7 company men”, they’re always there to help each other out, no matter what time of the day. When one of Graeme’s tyres blew out on the job, all it took was a quick phone call to Bernie, and in no time, the truck was back on the road as good as new. Their time as drivers, paired with their time as work partners, could have you thinking that they might be ready to hang up the keys. But Bernie and Graeme have no plans to slow down. With a new goal of clocking up 4 million kms together they've got a few more years to achieve this. In the meantime, it would be fair to say they’re one of the Group’s most successful and hard-working duos.