We're Here to Help Fix This Mess

'A truck was broke down here, another was overheating there.'

Part 1: Locked in My Shop, Going Crazy

More than a hundred kilometers beyond Montreal, Sam and his Nova Scotia friends spent their second night on the road at Herb's Travel Plaza, an hour east of their destination. The following day, they were herded by police into the Ottawa baseball stadium parking lot (aka Coventry), some distance from Parliament Hill.

"We all had CB radios, so we were talking," recalls Sam. "You could hear the Frenchmen that were from the area. They're like, 'That's not downtown. We're not going there, we're going downtown.' And you'd see them cut out of the line of trucks and head in a different direction."

The national headquarters of the RCMP is across the Vanier Parkway from the Coventry site. Directly to the northeast is the Department of National Defense. In this semi-industrial neighbourhood, Sam says their communication devices were obstructed. "On the way to Ottawa, we'd talked for hundreds of kilometers. When we got to Coventry, the CBs were jammed. I couldn't talk to the trucks beside me. Every time you'd key the mic it was this propagandist loop being played at a very, very high power. My government was blocking my transmissions. It was pathetic."

Sam spent much of the next day meeting people at Coventry. While useful as a supply depot and temporary respite, he says it was "a bad spot. That's not why we all packed up and left home - to sit in a parking lot" well away from the action. He and some others drove into the city in pickup trucks to assess the situation. "We meandered through Chinatown and routed a way in," he remembers. Then, "at three o'clock in the morning, we left Coventry and snuck in." When the flag-bedecked bobtails and pickups stopped for fuel on the outskirts, he says, paramedics standing in line at the cash register "were thanking us for showing up."

Before leaving home, Sam had turned his trailer into a portable repair shop. It's a converted toy hauler, with "a camper in front, but open concept in the back, and a big dropdown door." It has rudimentary washroom facilities, an oil drip stove, and a recliner. During those weeks in Ottawa, Sam explains, it "was hot all the time" inside that trailer. "So you could come in, dry your gloves, charge your phone, have a coffee." He continues:

It was a little hub of warmth and power. We bought straw bales to put around it. It was so freezing cold, and there was no insulation on the floor, which had this layer of ice on it. We also had a little diesel heater. And then two generators that we would flip flop - bring one into thaw, while the other one was running outdoors.

When I'd wake up in the morning, there were people sleeping inside.

Dubbed the Freedom Trailer, Sam attached a sign inviting the public to inscribe messages on its exterior with permanent markers. In part, the sign read: "Thank you one and all for the love and support...We are your friendly neighborhood mechanics. We are here to help fix this mess." By the time Sam returned to Nova Scotia, the trailer was covered with good wishes and gratitude. 

While at Coventry, Sam had let people know

that I was a mechanic and I was fully supplied and stocked, and I gave 'em all my contact information. Then we got downtown and my phone started ringing. A truck was broke down here, another was overheating there. For the first couple days, Andrew and I were able to get in in his service truck.

Joe and his sister Sabrina, from Saskatchewan, they would drive 24 hours a day and get me whatever I needed. If I needed a frying pan, if I needed jugs of coolant, if I needed parts they would deliver it right to wherever I was.

In the beginning, the police officers and the Ottawa municipal workers would move aside. 'Hey, we're here to fix one of the trucks.' They'd back the road graders out of the way, 'Yeah, come on through.' When we were done the repair, there were high fives, waving to everybody. We could drive right back up near Parliament Hill, where my trailer was parked on Wellington. It was a great relationship for the first little bit.

After the authorities installed dozens of concrete barriers throughout the downtown core, access became more difficult. "I think I lost 20 pounds, just hiking around with backpacks full of tools," says Sam. "As word got out, there were other mechanics in the convoy and we all just met each other and helped each other."

Soon, he says, "I became kind of a coordinator/dispatcher." Mechanics who lived in or near Ottawa would volunteer after work and on weekends. A chap named Nick drove in several times, "from Northern Ontario. He was a firefighter and a mechanic."

Someone Sam knew in Washington State introduced him to Brendan, a mechanic from Manitoulin Island. In total, he says, there were 10 of them who collectively accomplished amazing things:

If the truck had a regen problem, like an emissions issue, we'd take the particulate scrubbers out. Joe and Sabrina would put it in their pickup and race it out to the Kenworth dealership. The mechanics there would service the components, send it back to me with brand new clamps, brand new gaskets, and all the fixings. My guys would reinstall it for the trucker on the street, check that off the list, and off we go.

Sam (centre) with Saskatchewan truck driver Joe and his sister, Sabrina.

next installment: Getting Greasy for Freedom