General News
12 September, 2025
Night truck driving avoided
The ever-present issue of kangaroos becoming unwelcome moving obstacles for vehicles after hours on regional roads has combined with the aftermath of the Grampians fires and has resulted in at least one local trucking company having regular discussions with drivers about scheduling carting loads, with many drivers simply doing their utmost to avoid moving through certain areas at night.
The theory is that significant proportions of kangaroo populations have moved out of the National Park burnt areas to find feed.
Warracknabeal-based PonyXpress Parcel & Freight Distributors truck driver, Ash Holland, said the Sunraysia Highway “through the Pyrenees … St Arnaud (and) Avoca” was especially bad.
“(It’s) our worst spot,” he said.
Horsham Towing owner, Jamie Chandler, said although the numbers have “backed off a bit” from about a month ago, he attributed the scale of the problem to the fires, calling it “phenomenal”.
“Henty Highway is predominantly a place where most people won't now drive at night,” he said.
“The Grampians fires are a contributing factor, same with the desert – most of the grass is only starting to shoot back in there now, so over the next few months they’ll start moving back in.”
To some extent, he admitted it was “good for towies” and said “each tow company would have been doing, over a weekend, maybe between five and 15 (incidents)”.
Taylor Bros Transport manager, Gary Taylor, said, “There seems to be more of them”.
“Even Dadwell’s Bridge way there’s more than what there used to be,” he said.
“You’ve just got to be careful, we’re going down there a fair bit … we know roughly where most of them are and slow down a bit.”
Although trucks are less likely to be damaged severely enough to stop driving altogether, he said the results from collisions were still often inconvenient to repair.
“I’ve had a few bent bull bars, and sometimes they’ll go underneath and break your tap off the air tank or something, or they run into the side of the truck and break a few of the plastic mud guards on the trailers,” he said.
Wilken Group workshop administrator, Greg Wilson, said although the animals were “a problem everywhere,” he agreed there were certain local roads that were notorious hazards and admitted, “you can go at night, (but) you run the risk”.
“You go down through St Arnaud and that way, and they're heavy down through there,” he said.
“A lot of our drivers will try and get down to Melbourne, Geelong, (or) wherever, and go in the late afternoon to try and avoid those areas at night or early in the morning.”
Mr Wilson claimed culling wasn’t adequate to address the issue – “you can’t shoot enough of them” – singling out the process of applying for permission, deficient with Victoria’s Kangaroo Harvest Management Plan (KHMP) for 2024-2028.
“You’re not allowed to get permits to shoot many, from what I’m told,” he said.
“It's definitely a problem.”
Horsham Truck Company supplies parts for repairs, and director, Brendan Wills, said they were “constantly selling mud guards” and had noticed “a bit of a spike”, citing a recent driver who had a headlight replaced, only having to have another one ordered just two weeks later.
Despite the size of trucks, he said a straight hit can do a lot of damage.
“You see blokes who have taken the roof completely out the front – the whole front of the truck is all smashed in,” he said.
“You're doing the grill, you're doing the windscreen, everything to do with the front (and if) it goes through into the radiator, you start playing with the engine as well – so it can be a super expensive experience, that's for sure.”