Kriska, Britton Transport win Volvo Trucks Safety Awards

Oct. 7, 2014
  SAN DIEGO, CA.  In recognition of their outstanding safety efforts, Kriska Holdings Ltd. of Precott, Ontario and Britton Transport of Grand Forks, ND, were each awarded $25,000 as this year's winners of the Volvo Trucks Safety Awards.

SAN DIEGO, CA.  In recognition of their outstanding safety efforts, Kriska Holdings Ltd. of Precott, Ontario and Britton Transport of Grand Forks, ND, were each awarded $25,000 as this year’s winners of the Volvo Trucks Safety Awards. Joined by its cosponsor Michelin America Truck Tires, Volvo Trucks North America made the announcement and handed out the checks during the American Trucking Assns.' annual management conference and exhibition.

“By investing in innovative training programs, Kriska Holdings and Britton Transport achieved tremendous safety performance during the past year,” said Goran Nyberg, president of Volvo Trucks North American sales & marketing. “These results show that safety does not happen by chance, it happens by choice.”

Open to all U.S. and Canadian fleets with more than five Class 8 trucks, the awards have been given annually for six years to one fleet that travels more than 20 million mi. a year and one that travels less than 20 million mi.  Criteria for choosing winner includes accident frequency rates based on DOT recordable accidents and fleet safety programs.

Kriska, the winner in the over 20 category, had an accident frequency rate of just 0.25 while accumulating over 32 million miles in 2013 with its fleet of 340 tractors.  Its safety program includes a minimum of four weeks of in-cab training for new drivers, access to an in-house simulator for all drivers, and an active bonus plan for safe driving.  

“Safety is part of our culture for sure,” said Marak Seymour, president and CEO. “It’s not negotiable.  Our drivers are the ones who won this award. We just gave them the tools.”

Seymour added that the fleet would match the $25,000 Volvo award to create a pool of vacation vouchers for its safest drivers.

In business since 1980, truckload carrier Britton Transport ran 9.2 million miles last year, recording an accident frequency rate of just .32.  Its 97 Vovlo VN tractors are all fitted with a range of active safety devices as well as Volvo's I-Shift automated mechanical transmission. “We feel keeping drivers comfortable helps keep them more alert over their long days,” said Jim Stockeland, president.

Britton also runs a nine-week “driver finishing program” for CDL holders with less than two years’ experience and requires all of its drivers to take at least two safety courses every quarter.

“We really work hard at safety,” said Stockeland. “This award does not speak to one person’s efforts, or even a department’s efforts, but to a continual effort on behalf of the entire company to purposefully protect others.”

Stockeland added that the award would be reinvested in a safety program run by the North Dakota state trucking association and to purchase new safety technology for the fleet’s trucks.

About the Author

Jim Mele

Nationally recognized journalist, author and editor, Jim Mele joined Fleet Owner in 1986 with over a dozen years’ experience covering transportation as a newspaper reporter and magazine staff writer. Fleet Owner Magazine has won over 45 national editorial awards since his appointment as editor-in-chief in 1999.

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