Best fleets to drive for in '25
Welcome to the WHAT THE TRUCK?!? Newsletter presented by Truck Parking Club. In this issue, best fleets to drive for; Crawler turns 60; ride-along; and more.
Best driver seats in town
CarriersEdge
The list — As Chris Jericho used to say, 'You've made the list!' CarriersEdge has dropped its annual list of best fleets to drive for. According to the provider of online driver training, 'To be considered for the 2025 Best Fleets program, for-hire carriers operating 10 tractor-trailers or more were nominated by a company driver or owner-operator currently working with them.'
Those nominations were then evaluated based on criteria such as driver compensation, HR, operations, work/life balance and more. The highest-scoring fleets made the list, while those that have been on it for 10 consecutive years were inducted in the Hall of Fame.
WWECarriersEdge
Top 20 Best Fleets to Drive For
– America's Service Line – Green Bay, Wisconsin
– American Central Transport – Kansas City, Missouri
– Brenny Specialized Inc. – St. Joseph, Minnesota
– C.A.T. Inc. – Coteau-du-Lac, Quebec, Canada
– Challenger Motor Freight Inc. – Cambridge, Ontario
– Chief Carriers Inc. – Grand Island, Nebraska
– Continental Express Inc. – Sidney, Ohio
– Crawford Trucking – Des Moines, Iowa
– Decker Truck Line Inc. – Fort Dodge, Iowa
– Fortigo Freight Services Inc. – Etobicoke, Ontario
– Fremont Contract Carriers Inc. – Fremont, Nebraska
– Ippolito Transportation – Burlington, Ontario
– K & J Trucking Inc. – Sioux Falls, South Dakota
– Kriska Holdings Ltd. – Prescott, Ontario
– Leonard's Express Inc. – Farmington, New York
– PGT Trucking Inc. – Aliquippa, Pennsylvania
– Thomas E. Keller Trucking Inc. – Defiance, Ohio
– TLD Logistics Services Inc. – Knoxville, Tennessee
– TransLand – Strafford, Missouri
– Wellington Motor Freight – Aberfoyle, Ontario
That list will be culled down to the two finalists in the small and large fleet categories. That pair of winning fleets will receive the Stratosphere award at the Best Fleets Education & Awards Conference, March 3-4, at the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte, North Carolina.Do you agree? Had a good or bad experience with any of these? Email me.Happy birthday NASA heavy haul
X
The beast turns 60 – Aside from the shuttle, the crawler may be NASA's coolest piece of equipment. Before you even put a rocket on it, this thing has a mass of 6,000 pounds! The only good news: If one starts to chase you, it wouldn't be hard to outrun. They're called crawlers for a reason: They move at 3.5 mph.
In total, they've driven 3,400 miles. At 3.5 mph, it would take almost 40 days to cover that distance in one go. No speed limiters required here!
The first two crawlers each cost $14 million in 1965 dollars ($139 million in 2025 bucks), and if that doesn't pump you up, their names will: Hans and Franz.
Watch a great video on the history of the crawler right here. And stay tuned to WTT in February when we have NASA on to talk all about crawlers!
The Motion Museum's journey to Chattanooga
X
Ride-along – On our first episode of the year, we talked about our purchase of the world's largest model rail set from EnterTRAINment Junction. You can watch this episode for all the details. Coming next week, the journey to Chattanooga, Tennessee, begins. It's taken about 20 trailers to load the set, and on Tuesday I'm doing a ride-along with one of the drivers hauling it back to Chattanooga. Check out the coverage next Wednesday on WHAT THE TRUCK?!? and follow along on my social media, where I'll be vlogging some of my journey.
WTT FridayFreight Essentials vs. WWEX Group; project44 vs. MyCarrier – Friday on WHAT THE TRUCK?!?, I'm catching up with Freight Essentials' Dylan Admire to learn the latest about the company's RICO lawsuit against WWEX Group.
Project44 is battling MyCarrier in court. The FreightTech visibility leader claims MyCarrier breached their contract when it went behind project44's back and created its own electronic bill of lading and APIs.
Truck Parking Club has been scaling massively as it continues to expand its mission to provide truck parking for drivers. Reed Loustalot stops by the studio to talk about how the company has managed to scale and why we're partnering again this year at the Mid-America Trucking Show.AI-driven virtual agents are starting to answer the call. We'll talk to David Bell about how CloneOps is innovating in supply chain AI.
Plus, all the latest headlines, trends and viral weirdness since our last show.Catch new shows live at noon EST Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays on FreightWaves LinkedIn, Facebook, X or YouTube, or on demand by looking up WHAT THE TRUCK?!? on your favorite podcast player and at 5 p.m. Eastern on SiriusXM's Road Dog Trucking Channel 146.
MAFA
MAKE AMERICA FREIGHT AGAIN – We are so back. Head on over to WTTGear.com to get our newest merch! Use code WTTFans for 10% off.
Now on demandThanks for reading, and feel free to forward this to a friend.
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Yahoo
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Opinion - Trump's palace coup leaves NASA in limbo
When President-elect Donald Trump nominated Jared Isaacman to become NASA administrator, it seemed like a brilliant choice. Business entrepreneur, private astronaut, Isaacman was just the man to revamp NASA and make it into a catalyst for taking humanity to the moon, Mars and beyond. Isaacman sailed through the confirmation process in the Senate Commerce Committee, chaired by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), by a vote of 19 to 9. He was poised to be confirmed by the full Senate when something so bizarre happened that it beggars the imagination. The White House suddenly and with no clear reason why, pulled Isaacman's nomination. After months of a confirmation process, NASA was back to square one for getting a new leader. Ars Technica's Eric Berger offered an explanation as to why. 'One mark against Isaacman is that he had recently donated money to Democrats,' he wrote. 'He also indicated opposition to some of the White House's proposed cuts to NASA's science budget.' But these facts were well known even before Trump nominated Isaacman. Trump himself, before he ran for president as a Republican, donated to Democrats and was close friends with Bill and Hillary Clinton. Berger goes on to say that a source told the publication that, 'with Musk's exit, his opponents within the administration sought to punish him by killing Isaacman's nomination.' The idea that Isaacman's nomination is being deep-sixed because of Musk runs contrary to the public praise that the president has given the billionaire rocket and electric car entrepreneur. Trump was uncharacteristically terse in his own social media post. 'After a thorough review of prior associations, I am hereby withdrawing the nomination of Jared Isaacman to head NASA,' he wrote. 'I will soon announce a new nominee who will be mission aligned, and put America First in Space. Thank you for your attention to this matter!' CNN reports that Isaacman's ouster was the result of a palace coup, noting that a source said, 'Musk's exit left room for a faction of people in Trump's inner circle, particularly Sergio Gor, the longtime Trump supporter and director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office, to advocate for installing a different nominee.' The motive seems to be discontent about the outsized influence that Musk has had on the White House and a desire to take him down a peg or two. Isaacman was profoundly gracious, stating in part, 'I am incredibly grateful to President Trump @POTUS, the Senate and all those who supported me throughout this journey. The past six months have been enlightening and, honestly, a bit thrilling. I have gained a much deeper appreciation for the complexities of government and the weight our political leaders carry.' The idea that a man like Isaacman, well respected by the aerospace community, who was predicted to sail through a confirmation vote in the full Senate, could be taken down by an obscure bureaucrat in White House intrigue, motivated by petty spite, is mind boggling. Even Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), who has not been fond of Trump's space policy, was appalled. He posted on his X account that Isaacman 'ran into the kind of politics that is damaging our country.' 'Republicans and Democrats supported him as the right guy at the right time for the top job at NASA, but it wasn't enough.' NASA is in for months more of turmoil and uncertainty as the nomination process gets reset and starts grinding its way through the Senate. The draconian, truncated budget proposal is certainly not helpful, either. Congress, which had been supportive of Trump's space policy, is not likely to be pleased by the president's high-handed shivving of his own nominee. Whoever Trump chooses to replace Isaacman as NASA administrator nominee, no matter how qualified, should face some very direct questioning. Trump's NASA budget proposal should be dead on arrival, which, considering the cuts in science and technology, is not necessarily a bad thing. China must be looking at the spectacle of NASA being mired in political wrangling, a leadership vacuum and budget uncertainty with glee. Beijing has its own space ambitions, with a planned crewed lunar landing by 2030. It's possible that the Chinese will steal a march on NASA, with all the damage that will do to America's standing in the world. It didn't have to be this way. Isaacman could be settling in as NASA administrator, deploying his business acumen and vision to lead the space agency to its greatest achievements. Instead, America's space effort has received a self-inflicted blow from which it will be long in recovering, Mark R. Whittington, who writes frequently about space policy, has published a political study of space exploration entitled 'Why is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon?' as well as 'The Moon, Mars and Beyond,' and, most recently, 'Why is America Going Back to the Moon?' He blogs at Curmudgeons Corner. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Hill
4 hours ago
- The Hill
Trump's palace coup leaves NASA in limbo
When President-elect Donald Trump nominated Jared Isaacman to become NASA administrator, it seemed like a brilliant choice. Business entrepreneur, private astronaut, Isaacman was just the man to revamp NASA and make it into a catalyst for taking humanity to the moon, Mars and beyond. Isaacman sailed through the confirmation process in the Senate Commerce Committee, chaired by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), by a vote of 19 to 9. He was poised to be confirmed by the full Senate when something so bizarre happened that it beggars the imagination. The White House suddenly and with no clear reason why, pulled Isaacman's nomination. After months of a confirmation process, NASA was back to square one for getting a new leader. Ars Technica's Eric Berger offered an explanation as to why. 'One mark against Isaacman is that he had recently donated money to Democrats,' he wrote. 'He also indicated opposition to some of the White House's proposed cuts to NASA's science budget.' But these facts were well known even before Trump nominated Isaacman. Trump himself, before he ran for president as a Republican, donated to Democrats and was close friends with Bill and Hillary Clinton. Berger goes on to say that a source told the publication that, 'with Musk's exit, his opponents within the administration sought to punish him by killing Isaacman's nomination.' The idea that Isaacman's nomination is being deep-sixed because of Musk runs contrary to the public praise that the president has given the billionaire rocket and electric car entrepreneur. Trump was uncharacteristically terse in his own social media post. 'After a thorough review of prior associations, I am hereby withdrawing the nomination of Jared Isaacman to head NASA,' he wrote. 'I will soon announce a new nominee who will be mission aligned, and put America First in Space. Thank you for your attention to this matter!' CNN reports that Isaacman's ouster was the result of a palace coup, noting that a source said, 'Musk's exit left room for a faction of people in Trump's inner circle, particularly Sergio Gor, the longtime Trump supporter and director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office, to advocate for installing a different nominee.' The motive seems to be discontent about the outsized influence that Musk has had on the White House and a desire to take him down a peg or two. Isaacman was profoundly gracious, stating in part, 'I am incredibly grateful to President Trump @POTUS, the Senate and all those who supported me throughout this journey. The past six months have been enlightening and, honestly, a bit thrilling. I have gained a much deeper appreciation for the complexities of government and the weight our political leaders carry.' The idea that a man like Isaacman, well respected by the aerospace community, who was predicted to sail through a confirmation vote in the full Senate, could be taken down by an obscure bureaucrat in White House intrigue, motivated by petty spite, is mind boggling. Even Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), who has not been fond of Trump's space policy, was appalled. He posted on his X account that Isaacman 'ran into the kind of politics that is damaging our country.' 'Republicans and Democrats supported him as the right guy at the right time for the top job at NASA, but it wasn't enough.' NASA is in for months more of turmoil and uncertainty as the nomination process gets reset and starts grinding its way through the Senate. The draconian, truncated budget proposal is certainly not helpful, either. Congress, which had been supportive of Trump's space policy, is not likely to be pleased by the president's high-handed shivving of his own nominee. Whoever Trump chooses to replace Isaacman as NASA administrator nominee, no matter how qualified, should face some very direct questioning. Trump's NASA budget proposal should be dead on arrival, which, considering the cuts in science and technology, is not necessarily a bad thing. China must be looking at the spectacle of NASA being mired in political wrangling, a leadership vacuum and budget uncertainty with glee. Beijing has its own space ambitions, with a planned crewed lunar landing by 2030. It's possible that the Chinese will steal a march on NASA, with all the damage that will do to America's standing in the world. It didn't have to be this way. Isaacman could be settling in as NASA administrator, deploying his business acumen and vision to lead the space agency to its greatest achievements. Instead, America's space effort has received a self-inflicted blow from which it will be long in recovering, Mark R. Whittington, who writes frequently about space policy, has published a political study of space exploration entitled 'Why is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon?' as well as 'The Moon, Mars and Beyond,' and, most recently, 'Why is America Going Back to the Moon?' He blogs at Curmudgeons Corner.
Politico
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- Politico
Trump and Musk aides have spoken amid pause in hostilities
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