truck drivers in the St. Louis region are hitting the unemployment line after Yellow Freight shut down its operation. Our political editor, Mark Maxwell talked to several Teamsters as they paid final tre to the place where they
made a living. And he's live in Soulard, Mark and the abrupt fall of the natis third largest freight company or the weekend turned this bustling dockyard into a quiet ghost yar. Empty trailers and locked gates bar the entrance to a quiet dockyard at Yellow Freight. For more than four decades, this was as close to
home as it gets. Where's home? About two
blocks from here. Oh, nice. Yeah. Earl Muffet would walk to work where he'd meet his second family. What are you
going to miss most? The guys you know. After all, they did more than punch a cloc. They invested their time, labor, even their own money to keep the company afloat and that equates about $100,000 per man that we gave back and te company still couldn't make it. And it's just very frustrating that the higher ups, the CEO's and all this, they just took the money and noy knows where it went. Teamsters watched the stock price bottom t under $0.50 a share four days a, then jump 6 fold as a hedge fund swooped in to buy up
nearly a majority share of what's left of the com. Something needs to be done as far as an investigation. The money trail should be somewe and we should be Privy of it. Yeah, tell me about it. Bobby Bailey worked in the yard, earned his CDL and drove a truck here for six years. And to take 22,000 jobs and just throw that out. I mean, you know, guys
got mortgages, car payments, you know, multiplr payments and kids are
not cheap these days. He's a dad worried what
he'll tell his two daughters at home.
I can tell you're, you know, feeling some
things and
it sucks. You know, I've applied
to other places as he looks for a new job. He wants Congress to do theirs. Investigate, investigate. While they'll leave
some gear behind, they'll take the memories with . We love this place. You know, we're a family. We all know each other. You know we all. We're a family. You know, we're Teamsters. You know, it's a big family. And I've never had that any place to ever work before. A band of brothers sticking
together through hardships in and out
of the workplace. I left a beer can up there
for one last beer. And this is, this is one of our buddies who has been diagnosed h ALS and he's number one on the d down here and can't make it dow. So Mike, this is for you, buddy. One week ago they thought they were going to hit the picket li. Now many are hitting the
unemployment line, even as they wait for
that official notice that they've actually
been terminated. One worker who, whose
future is uncertain, said to me that they're watching these money moves on Wall Street as a hedge fund sweeps in to scavenge what's left of the com. The way he put it to me, yellow is worth more dead
than alive
in St. Louis. Mark Maxwell, 5 On Your .
