News Briefs - March 17
The Latest Headlines:
- USF Announces Standardization of LTL Offerings
- Exide, Volvo Ink Supply Deal
- Natso Decries Rest Stop Commercialization
- Flying J Founder Killed in Plane Crash
- Gasoline Prices Unlikely to Ease, Paper Says
- Bush To Address Country, World
- U.S., U.K. Ultimatum to UN Pushes Oil Prices
- Gas Prices Rise to All-Time High, AAA Says
- Exide, Volvo Ink Supply Deal
USF Announces Standardization of LTL Offerings
USFreightways Corp. said Monday that it was standardizing its services across all five of its less-than-truckload subsidiaries.The company said in a release that it will now offer its USF Premier, USF PremierPlus, USF Guaranteed, USF Guaranteed Before Noon and USF Expedited shipping services at all of its LTL carriers.
USF’s LTL regional and national subsidiaries are USF Bestway, USF Dugan, USF Holland, USF Red Star and USF Reddaway.
(Click here for the full press release.)
Exide, Volvo Ink Supply Deal
Exide Technologies and Volvo Trucks North America signed an exclusive three-year supply agreement, the battery maker said Monday.The new agreement expands on Exide’s current agreement with Mack Trucks, Exide said in its release.
Exide will now be the exclusive supplier of Mack Bulldog and Volvo branded batteries, and will supply products to the network of Volvo and Mack dealers in North America.
Mack and Exide have had a relationship “since the 1970s,” the company said. In December 2000, Volvo Trucks North American acquired Mack. Transport Topics
(Click here for the full press release.)
Natso Decries Rest Stop Commercialization
Natso, the national trade group representing truck stops and travel centers, said Monday that it is opposed to a provision in the Bush administration’s highway reauthorization bill that would commercialize rest stops on the nation’s highways.The legislation, Natso said, would allow states to launch pilot projects to commercialize rest areas. The group said that if this were to occur, then many interchange-based businesses like truck stops, travel plazas, hotels and restaurants would go out of business.
Natso President William D. Fay called the proposal "anti-business, anti-trucking" and "anti-community." Transport Topics
(Click here for the full press release.)
Flying J Founder Killed in Plane Crash
The founder and chairman of the board of Flying J Inc., O. Jay Call, was killed Saturday when a plane he was flying crashed outside of Haily, Idaho, the company said Monday.Call, who founded the diesel distributor in 1968, was flying former vice president and current board member, Richard E. Germer and his wife Ilene to Sun Valley, Idaho Saturday when the craft disappeared from controllers’ radar screens, the company said.
The plane went down about five mile south of Sun Valley killing all aboard. The cause of accident is currently unknown, the company said, but an investigation is ongoing.
Flying J grew from four retail gasoline stations in 1968, the company said, to the largest retail distributor of diesel fuel in the United States with sales of more than $4.6 billion. Transport Topics
Gasoline Prices Unlikely to Ease, Paper Says
The price of gasoline, one of trucking’s major fuels, will not decline any time soon, analysts told the Wall Street Journal, even as the price of crude oil relaxes a bit.Analysts told the Journal that continued tightness in U.S. crude oil and problems with gasoline production, particularly on the West Coast.
In California, the Journal reported, the gasoline supply continues to be hurt by refinery-maintenance issues and complications involved in producing new fuels blended with ethanol. These supply problems have rippled out to other Western states, the paper said. Transport Topics
Bush To Address Country, World
The White House said Monday morning that President Bush would address the nation at 8 p.m. EST to give Saddam Hussein one final ultimatum, the Associated Press reported.Spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters that Bush will tell Hussein that in order to avoid military conflict, he must step down and leave Iraq, AP said.
Since its weekend summit with allies Spain and Great Britain, the White House has ramped up the war rhetoric. Fleischer told reporters that the window for a diplomatic solution to the crisis has closed, AP said.
Fleischer also said that U.S. officials were considering raising the national terror alert, AP reported. Transport Topics
U.S., U.K. Ultimatum to UN Pushes Oil Prices
The price of crude oil rose as much as $1.57 a barrel after the United States, and its allies Spain and Great Britain, told the United Nations it has until today to break a deadlock about using military force to disarm Iraq, Bloomberg reported.The move seemed to bring the region closer to war and raised concerns about the availability of oil, Bloomberg said. Iraq pumps 3% of the world’s oil.
The increase in oil prices, about 4.4% on the New York Mercantile Exchange in after-hours trading to $36.95 a barrel, Bloomberg said. On March 14, the last trading day before the weekend, oil prices fell 63 cents a barrel on expectation that a potential war would not last long.
Two members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, Kuwait and Venezuela, tried to reassure the market by saying they could increase their output if a war in Iraq impinges on oil exports from that country, Bloomberg said. Transport Topics
Gas Prices Rise to All-Time High, AAA Says
The national average price of gasoline rose to an all-time high of $1.719 on March 14, AAA said on its Web site.The prices of fuels like gasoline and diesel have risen this year as crude oil inventories have tightened, analysts told Bloomberg News.
Cold weather in the United States, a crippling strike in Venezuela and growing concern over the possibility of war in Iraq have all pushed oil prices higher recently. Transport Topics
