Women lead trucking industry charge to get more female big-riggers behind wheel
VAUDREUIL-DORION, Que. — On a cloudy Monday in late August, Vivianne Carbonneau fires the ignition on her semi truck bearing the load of both an 80,000-pound trailer and a new job title hitched to her name: driving mentor.
“If you learn from a woman, you always have that little voice inside that says, ‘See, I can do it,’” she said. “Any situation can be overcome.”
Carbonneau, 58, has been hauling freight for only two years, but has taken on an in-house teaching role to help new drivers — especially women, but men too — at XTL Transport, the first woman to do so at the Montreal-area trucking company in its 33-year history.
“It is a guys’ culture,” she said of the industry. “Sometimes you go somewhere, and it’s palpable. You can feel it — you can feel that you’re not exactly welcome.