{"id":1839,"date":"2015-11-06T18:55:56","date_gmt":"2015-11-06T18:55:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/belleville-trucker-notches-a-brace-with-national-driver-of-the-year-title\/"},"modified":"2025-01-10T16:51:29","modified_gmt":"2025-01-10T16:51:29","slug":"belleville-trucker-notches-a-brace-with-national-driver-of-the-year-title","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/belleville-trucker-notches-a-brace-with-national-driver-of-the-year-title\/","title":{"rendered":"Belleville Trucker Notches a Brace With National Driver of the Year Title"},"content":{"rendered":"

After 48 years on the road and 8.5 million accident-free kilometres, Meyers Transport driver Dale Cockins probably thought his best memories on the job might have been behind him. He admits today he could have never imagined receiving two of the industry\u2019s most prestigious driving awards in back-to-back years near the tail end of his career.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what happened at the Ontario Trucking Association\u2019s annual convention luncheon where \u2013 a year after being crowned the top driver in Ontario<\/a> \u2013 Cockins was back at the Ritz in Toronto notching a \u2018brace\u2019 for also being recognized as the National Truck Driver of the Year.<\/p>\n

The award, established by the CTA and sponsored by Volvo Trucks Canada, is the highest honour bestowed upon a truck driver in Canada who has maintained a collision-free driving record and demonstrated exemplary professionalism both on and off the road.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith this award, dale is the best of the best. He embodies the definition of a trucker\u2019s trucker; he\u2019s safe, passionate and truly cares about the people that work alongside him, his customers and other drivers he shares road with,\u201d says CTA president, David Bradley.<\/p>\n

Added Peter Currie, Ontario district manager, Volvo Trucks Canada: \u201cIt is a pleasure to see Dale back at this podium. He personifies what these awards are truly about. After all these years, he still has the passion and fire in his belly for the job he loves.\u201d<\/p>\n

<<<\/strong>Click here<\/strong><\/a> to see a cool video profile of this most deserving truck driver of the year>><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong>Born and raised in Roslin, Ont., near Belleville, Dale grew up working with heavy machinery on the family dairy farm and in the bush cutting logs with his father and brother. When he was 14, a neighbouring farmer asked Dale if he would deliver milk in the summer. \u201cI said, \u2018well, Bill, I don\u2019t have a driver\u2019s licence,\u2019\u201d Cockins recalls with a wry smile. \u201cSo he says back to me, \u2018aww, you\u2019ll be alright.\u2019 So, I did.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still in high school, Dale\u2019s older brother Wayne taught him to drive a truck and they ran as a part-time team until Dale was old enough to buy his own power unit \u2013 a 1961 International 4-ton \u2013 to haul pulpwood. He chopped the wood at night and delivered it in the morning before classes. Since then, Dale has owned eight trucks and driven nearly 9 million km with no preventable collisions. He has been with Meyers Transport of Belleville for the last 22 years, originally as an owner-operator and currently as a company driver.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s efficient, he\u2019s dependable and above all, he\u2019s safe,\u201d says company president Jacquie Meyers. \u201cEqually important, he always puts customers first. He goes the extra mile to make sure our customers are happy, whether he\u2019s met them or not.\u201d<\/p>\n

That was never truer than a few years ago on the afternoon of Christmas Eve, when Dale noticed a child\u2019s swing set sitting on the dock that had arrived late from the shipper. Knowing in his heart there would be a child somewhere without a gift on Christmas morning, Dale called the customer at home and arranged to deliver it personally. They agreed to meet at a local mall, but right away Dale knew the large box wasn\u2019t going to fit in the customer\u2019s car. So, like a real-life Santa Claus, he piloted his 18-wheeled sleigh to the family\u2019s front door and unloaded the swing set.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s just typical Dale,\u201d says Meyers\u2019 VP of Operations, Joe Ball. \u201cIt\u2019s the kind of thing he does without hesitation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dale has also performed many acts of courtesy and chivalry on the road. Whether it\u2019s putting out car fires, attending to people at accident scenes, or pulling fellow drivers\u2019 trucks out of ditches, he always stops when there\u2019s someone in need of assistance.<\/p>\n

Dale says the most gratifying point in his career came in 1998 during the ice storms of Quebec and Eastern Ontario. He was one of several truckers who volunteered to deliver food and supplies for two months to stranded people who had no heat or power.\u00a0 \u201cIt was trucks that got those people back on their feet \u2013 it was trucks!\u201d Dale says passionately. \u201cI\u2019ll never forget that \u2013 the smiles, the handshakes \u2013 just how thankful they were for every load. That\u2019ll stay with me forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

The CTA-Volvo Trucks Canada National Truck Driver of the Year is selected among all of the year\u2019s provincial Driver of the Year recipients by a panel of judges made up of representatives from Transport Canada, the Traffic Industry Research Foundation and the Canada Safety Council.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After 48 years on the road and 8.5 million accident-free kilometres, Meyers Transport driver Dale Cockins probably thought his best memories on the job might have been behind him. He…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":434,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[158,45],"tags":[259,492,179,493,494,495],"class_list":["post-1839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-announcements","category-industry-image-pr","tag-awards","tag-dale-cockins","tag-driver-of-the-year","tag-meyers-transport","tag-ota-events","tag-volvo-trucks"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}