Hurricane Helene, a recent Category 4 storm, followed by Hurricane Milton, a Category 3 storm, has devastated several southeastern states. This tragedy strikes close to home for Ruan truck driver and team safety instructor, James Coviak, from our Huntsville, AL, operation, and his wife, Rachel, who have strong ties to the affected communities. 
The Coviak family recognized the need to support the community they consider home away from home and quickly began brainstorming ways to help. It all started when James contacted Dedicated Transportation Manager Mike Steely, seeking assistance transporting water to the affected areas. Steely seized the opportunity to partner with Premium Waters, which provided a full truckload of water to Atkinson County, GA—a city of 8,000 people—where the Coviak family was actively involved. This truckload was part of at least 40 loads sent by Premium Waters to other affected areas. Ruan also partnered to deliver a load of donated supplies from Target to Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, TN, which is currently serving as a major donation and collection site.
Steely didn’t stop there. Determined to act quickly, he set out to find an available Ruan truck to transport supplies to Atkinson County.
Meanwhile, Rachel posted an outreach message on her business’s Facebook page, asking the community for donated goods. Within 24 hours, the Coviak family received an overwhelming response from neighbors, with a tractor and trailer parked on their front lawn, quickly filling up with supplies—including pallets of non-perishable foods, water, charcoal grills, griddles, tarps, and several moving boxes from another Ruan driver.
After a few days of collecting and loading the supplies, James and his son, Ashton Coviak—currently part of Ruan’s Safe Driver Apprenticeship Pilot Program at the Huntsville operation—set off on the 8-hour trek from Trinity, AL, to Atkinson County to deliver critical supplies to the community. Upon arriving, they were escorted by the Atkinson County Sheriff’s Office as they made the first of four stops during their roughly 14-hour day of delivering and offloading the goods. A crucial part of their mission was to provide relief to first responders and their families, offering much-needed support to those tirelessly serving the community and putting others' needs before their own.
What’s next for the Coviak family? “Our next steps are to continue to monitor the area and see what they will need,” says James. “They will be without power for a long time.”
Coming off a busy week between James' work and volunteer schedules, he celebrated his fourth anniversary with Ruan. “James has been an outstanding driver for Ruan for the past four years and is always the first to step up and help. This is just another example of that—where as soon as he got word that help was needed, he stepped up and coordinated getting everything he could down to help as many people as possible,” Steely noted.
Additionally, our hardworking teams, in partnership with vital customer MacLean Power Systems, are relentlessly working to ship out roughly double-to-triple the usual volume of essential products to impacted customers in restoration efforts. We are proud to be part of MacLean’s mission to restore power to millions of people.
We wholeheartedly thank our drivers, team members, enduring partners, and everyone who is currently lending a helping hand to the communities catastrophically impacted by Hurricane Helene and Milton. In a time of devastation, your selfless efforts and unwavering support have made a world of difference, bringing hope and relief to those in need.
