Certificate III in Supply Operations is a foundational program that equips participants with a solid understanding of logistics processes, supply chain management, and road transport regulations, preparing them for entry-level roles in the industry and serving as a steppingstone for career advancement.

Certificate III in Transport and Logistics (Driver and Supply Operations) equips graduates with the skills needed to oversee teams and operations effectively. Specifically, it fosters leadership development, empowering graduates with supervisory skills for effective team management and operational optimisation.

The recent graduation celebrated the achievements of Helene Ruhl, Brendan Turnbull, Jenna Wells, Monali Perera, Tiarni Botefuhr, Jamie Bear, Clesia Ape, Reece Williams, and Mark Geekie.

Centurion’s Mackay Branch Operations Manager, Jodie Van Sluys, emphasised the valuable contribution of from the Saltera Training team, who have supported the program over the years.

“Ian’s dedication to working individually with all our students, irrespective of their educational background or learning pace, reflects his profound understanding of our company’s diverse workforce.”

In collaboration with the Saltera team the program commenced in October 2021 and has resulted in the successful commencement of 40 new employees in Mackay, on Certificate III level traineeships.

“The exceptional quality of training provided on-site, tailored to our operations by trainer Ian, alongside the seamless coordination and collaboration from the broader Saltera team, has been exemplary. This success led to the expansion of Saltera’s delivery of traineeships to other Centurion branches in Queensland without hesitation,” said Ms Van Sluys.

Centurion recognises that training is crucial for future-proofing the workforce, particularly through on-site, role-relevant traineeships. Saltera has proven itself as a training organisation that operates with integrity, flexibility, and industry currency.

Graduates from this program complete both the Certificate III in Supply Operations and in Transport and Logistics and gain hands-on experience in critical logistics environments that help to equip them with practical, real-world skills.

The Certificate III in Supply Operations programs ensures regulatory compliance by imparting comprehensive knowledge of road transport regulations, which reduces legal risks for employers. Additionally, it facilitates skill diversification, as graduates acquire a broad range of skills applicable across various roles in the transportation and logistics sector.

Lastly, it enhances industry awareness by exposing participants to industry-specific technologies and practices, fostering adaptability and familiarity with emerging trends.

Similarly, the Certificate III in Transport and Logistics (Driver and Supply Operations) brings numerous advantages. Building upon the foundation of the Certificate II program, this advanced program delves deeper into complex logistics concepts.

The Certification enhances problem-solving abilities, enabling graduates to tackle complex operational challenges, thus ensuring smoother operations. Completion of this program also brings industry recognition and qualifies individuals for more advanced roles, leading to career growth. Graduates are prepared to take on responsibilities related to coordination, supervision, and even leadership roles within the industry.

The achievements of the graduates underscores the commitment of both Centurion and Saltera to future-proofing the workforce through quality training, paving the way for continued growth and success within the transportation and logistics sector.

(L-R): Ian Burkitt (Saltera), Jenna Wells, Monali Perera, Tiarni Botefuhr, Jamie Bear, Clesia Ape, Reece Williams, Mark Geekie, and Johann Strydom.

(L-R): Ian Burkitt (Saltera) and Brendan Turnbull (Linehaul Driver).

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Centurion has always strived for excellence in safety standards. Janet Walsh, Senior Health, Safety, Environment, and Quality (HSEQ) Advisor, emphasises this commitment: “Safety is the foundation upon which Centurion operates. Our continuous journey of improving our safety culture is a collaborative effort that must be a 24/7 mindset.”

Throughout this National Safe Work Month, Centurion will be focusing on fundamental safety topics each week, demonstrating the Company’s commitment to safety across their nationwide network.

In the first week of National Safe Work Month, the Company spotlights the significance of teamwork in managing workplace risks. Identifying and reporting hazards is a collective responsibility. Centurion urges all team members to actively engage in hazard identification and reporting. This proactive approach not only ensures the safety of colleagues but also contributes to a safer working environment for all.

Week two is dedicated to protecting the mental health of our workers. Centurion recognises that being safe and healthy goes beyond physical well-being. Mental health is just as important. Resources and support are provided to help team members understand and manage psychosocial hazards within their workplace. A healthy mind leads to a safer workplace.

In the third week, the Company’s focus is on promoting a positive safety culture; drawing attention to hazards present for new and young workers, culturally or linguistically diverse workers, isolated and remote workers, and workers returning to work from injury. At Centurion, they believe in supporting and educating all workers. A positive safety culture is built on trust, respect, and open communication. Every worker is encouraged to actively participate in creating a culture prioritises safety.

Approaching the final week of National Safe Work Month, Centurion underscores the importance of preventing accidents and incidents. Safety is not just a goal; it’s a commitment.

A robust safety culture not only enhances safety but also yields positive benefits in terms of productivity and worker confidence. As Janet Walsh states, “Improved morale, safety, and productivity are intertwined. When our teams feel safe and confident, they deliver their best, ultimately benefiting our valued customers.” National Safe Work Month serves as a collective reminder of the shared responsibility to maintain safe workplaces. It’s a time for everyone to unite and ensure that safety remains a fundamental priority in all activities. By working together and fostering a culture of safety, they aim to realise a workplace where everyone can thrive.

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The award is presented to a company that has delivered an outstanding performance in safety, compliance and service.

Mr Cardaci said the award was an acknowledgment of the hard work and dedication of the Centurion team.

Woolworths’ Head of Contracts and Commercial Rob Agnew with Justin Cardaci at the awards presentation.

Centurion first partnered with Woolworths in 1999 to service their stores in the Karratha region. The company now services all 14 Woolworths stores north of Perth, the furthest being Derby which is almost a 5,000km round trip and a four-day turnaround from our Perth headquarters.

Centurion was praised for its safety and its commitment to servicing its customers. During the cyclones and floods in the North West earlier this year, Centurion went above and beyond by commissioning a barge and redirecting road freight through the ports of Dampier and Broome to ensure vital supplies could be delivered to the Broome store and local community.

Centurion loaded seven refrigerated trailers of produce on to a barge at Dampier port to arrive in Broome two days later and then used our local fleet to distribute the goods to the local supermarkets. You can read more about the barge move here.

Centurion’s investment in Seeing Machines throughout its fleet was also recognised. General Manager International and Domestic Transport, Chris Brooks, said Woolworths takes safety seriously in every aspect of their transport business.

“We work closely with our transport providers to continually improve road safety so everyone can return home safely to their families every day,” Chris said.

“Over the past 12 months, we have seen the adoption of fatigue detection systems which is a great demonstration of safety leadership by our carriers.”

Woolworths relies heavily on its carrier partners to ensure safe and efficient transport to the Woolworths Group’s network of supermarkets, Metro stores, BIG W and liquor outlets with over 6,000 heavy vehicle movements required each day around Australia.

A video put together by the Woolworths team about our partnership can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jimQ9UuiXXc&feature=youtu.be

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The cost of continuous repair and maintenance plus out dated technology signalled it was time to change to new vehicles.

After various brands & models of other trucks where evaluated over of many months of testing  the Mercedes Benz Actros 2646 & 2651 was chosen as the replacement for our Metro and Regional operations of 12 regional branches.

Centurion National Plant and Asset Manager Andrew Foster said the trucks were primarily chosen because for their safety and environmental performance.

“The trucks are fitted with all the latest safety features including adaptive cruise control, very sensitive brake assist & lane assist ” Mr Foster said. “They have sensors which pick up on any objects, such as kangaroos or stray cows, that could come into the truck’s path during a journey and automatically apply the brakes. The trucks also have ABS, EBS & ESP technology on board.”

The Mercedes Actros are also Euro6 compliant resulting in lower emissions and better fuel economy, reducing costs and benefitting the environment.

Every truck is fitted with telematics technology. This allows Andrew to see how the drivers are travelling and identify good & bad driving habits as well as reward those who demonstrate a consistent high standard of safety on our roads. The telematics also provide valuable industry knowledge on driver habits and areas for improvement.

Read The West Australian’s review of the Actros trucks here.

Andrew said that feedback from the drivers had been very positive. “Many of the drivers have remarked on the comfort of the cabs and the ease of access in to the cabin special when they are doing multi drops”

The Mercedes trucks have lots of the luxury elements that you would expect from their cars – smooth and quiet to drive, as well as the stylish dash.

Centurion will finish rolling out the new fleet at the end of November.

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They commission Centurion to get a system up and running from scratch including a bespoke online portal that allows the customer to monitor and manage their stock, freight and vendors with end to end visibility.

There was only one catch, it had to be fully operational, with trained staff and ready to receipt within two weeks.

Our relatively newly established services in Adelaide had been supporting the upgrade project with oversize and general transport services for several months and this was an opportunity to further support the project.

A number of Centurion’s specialist Perth OSR team flew to site to set up the service. This included painting safety walkways, installing benches and barricades, and setting up the IT infrastructure and scanning equipment – turning the empty premises into a fully functional OSR.

Centurion Divisional Manager Contract Delivery Lucy Ford said the customer remit of ensuring there was value and stock visibility, improved processes and efficiency all done in the safest possible way was achieved.

“After two weeks the facility was fully decked out to operate as a full offsite receiving facility within the customer system staffed by our Perth secondment staff and local employees,”Mrs Ford said.

“One of our Perth employees relocated to Adelaide for the project to train up local staff for the duration of the shutdown.

“This is a major milestone as we always knew that our processes and practices for OSR where robust and could be implemented in other locations, and now we know they can be rapidly deployed,” she said.

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Working for major global mining services provider Thiess, the scope of Centurion’s work was to safely and efficiently relocate five CAT 793 Dump Trucks and two Liebherr 996 Excavators from Prominent Hill SA to the Mount Pleasant Mine in Muswellbrook NSW, and one 996 from Prominent Hill to Peak Downs in Queensland.

The project requirements also included the relocation of two large cranes to the Prominent Hill site; a 250T Crawler Crane from Western Australia and another 150T Crawler Crane from Darwin.

The decommissioning logistics included 62 loads in total covering a massive 260,400kms with more than 4,600 in cab hours worked.

Centurion used a variety of specialist equipment for the move including Kenworth, Mack and Freightliner Prime Movers, Drake Platform Trailers and Low Loaders as well as Centurion’s state of the art tyre trailers. A number of contractors were also used as part of the move.

Planning for the work was carried out by Jason Carnes, Centurion’s Divisional Manager Heavy Haulage East who liaised with relevant authorities and scheduled fleet requirements around each machine as it was stripped and decommissioned on site minimising trailer and truck downtime.

The moves were completed on time and within budget over an 8 week period with no injuries.

“This was a significant logistical exercise for us where we needed to work closely with both our clients and other contractors involved in the move to ensure delivery of the equipment on time and without any issues,” Mr Carnes said.

“Centurion only recently set up its east coast operation but the company has tapped into pre-existing industry expertise to ensure we are delivering the highest level of service to our valued customers.

“Feedback from our client in Prominent Hill was that they were very pleased with the professional way we managed this project, and the efforts of our supervisor, drivers and contractors involved were much appreciated,” Mr Carnes concluded.

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WA Minister for Transport, Planning and Lands Rita Saffioti was onsite last week to officially launch the technology with Centurion CEO Justin Cardaci at the company’s Perth headquarters.

Centurion will become the first large-scale transport and logistics company to fit the Seeing Machine’s Guardian System technology across its entire fleet as well as to vehicles operated by its contractors.

The technology uses advanced computer vision technology to detect driver fatigue and distraction events and, using in-cabin alarms and seat vibration, alerts affected drivers in order to prevent incidents from happening.

According to the Road Safety Commission 21 per cent of fatal and serious crashes in regional WA involve fatigue while it is estimated that globally one in six heavy vehicle fatalities are caused by drowsy drivers.

Nearly 80 per cent of Centurion’s fleet has now been fitted with the technology with the remainder to be installed on vehicles over the next six months.

The investment in this technology, which is close to $1.5m, underlines Centurion’s commitment to safety across a fleet that services the mining, energy, construction and retail sectors in Australia.

Transport Minister Rita Saffioti said the State Government was investing record funding on roads and it was encouraging to see companies also invest in safety.

“Technology is continually helping to keep Western Australians safe on our roads and this initiative from Centurion is encouraging to see.”

Rita Saffioti Minister for Transport, Planning and Lands with Centurion CEO Justin Cardaci and Seeing Machine’s technician.

Centurion CEO Justin Cardaci said the company was focused on doing everything it could to mitigate the risks of fatigue.

“Our focus is on the safe and reliable movement of goods and equipment for our customers,” Mr Cardaci said.

“As a business we want to set a benchmark for safety in the industry.

“We have rigorous policies and procedures that deal with fatigue, however, the reality is that it remains a major issue in our industry and we need to do all we can to minimise its impact.

“This technology uses an in-cab driver sensor and forward-facing cameras as well as face and eye tracking algorithms, to detect the symptoms of fatigue and alert affected drivers.

“We believe the implementation of this technology across our entire fleet is an industry first and reinforces our commitment to our safety culture and to our goal of zero harm to all involved in our operations.”

“Centurion’s culture of safety is commendable,” added Paul Angelatos, SVP and GM, Fleet, Rail and Off-Road at Seeing Machines.

“We are delighted to be working with the team at Centurion to help them protect drivers and improve safety across their fleet, which in turn makes roads safer for the greater communities they serve and operate in.”

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The new trailer design means, for the first time, tyre trailers loaded with some of the largest heavy equipment tyres, can be used in a triple road train configuration reducing the number of drivers, pilots and trailers required for each trip.

Traditionally, the largest dump or haul truck tyres have had to be transported horizontally or lay flat on a flat top trailer. This makes the load oversize and requires it to have an oversize permit and pilot for transportation. It also means that, in the past, these tyres have only been transported in a truck and single trailer configuration.

The new trailer design allows for the tyres to be ‘stood up’ and transported vertically reducing the excessive width and removing the need for the oversize permit and the pilot. As a result, one truck can haul twice as many tyres in a single trip significantly reducing the transport costs per tyre.

The tyre trailer complies with Performance Based Standards (PBS) – a National Heavy Vehicle Regulator scheme that tests the asset against 16 stringent safety standards and four infrastructure standards ensuring it fits the existing road network and is safe.

Each trailer is fitted with electronic stability control to further improve the safety performance.

According to Centurion CEO Justin Cardaci the development of the trailer is a result of the business listening and responding to its customers’ needs as Centurion aims to continually improve its business services offering as well as its safety performance.

“We transported more than 2,600 heavy equipment tyres last year to various mine sites across WA so the development of the new trailer is an important innovation for our business,” Mr Cardaci said.

“The trailer allows us to transport some of the largest heavy mobile equipment tyres as part of a triple road train configuration which significantly improves our efficiency and boosts our productivity in this area.”

Mr Cardaci said the new trailer design would also improve safety – something that Centurion was continually looking to do.

“The automation of tyre loading and unloading and the reduction in manual restraining minimises the risk of injury and makes the whole process of transferring tyres to mine sites safer,” he said.

“The tyres are locked into place remotely which means the operator is always a safe distance from the trailer during a critical part of the loading.”

The tyre trailer, which has been 12 months in design, development and manufacture, provides a more reliable, cheaper and safer solution for transporting tyres to what is currently used in the transport industry.

“The climate at the moment is very much about how and where we can add value and support our clients by finding efficiencies in the supply chain and this trailer is a great example of how we are doing that,” Mr Cardaci said.

A combination of industry specialists were involved in the project to rethink how tyres could be transported and the trailer meets all Department of Transport requirements. The design and manufacture was conducted by a small Western Australian business.

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Centurion operates approximately one in four road trains on some key strategic routes from Perth to the north and north-west of the State.

Feedback from Centurion’s network of drivers in the past has been that while many motorists and caravaners know the correct procedures to pass there are always some less experienced who don’t.

And with many road trains longer than 50 meters, passing them, or being passed, when towing a caravan or even just in a car, can be a challenge and the consequences of not driving safely can be catastrophic.

According to Justin Cardaci Executive General Manager of Centurion Transport, safety is the number one priority for his drivers.

“We understand that cars, caravans and road trains all have to share the roads and we want everyone to arrive at their destination safely,” Mr Cardaci said.

“Passing a road train can be an intimidating experience for motorists and caravaners, but it can also be nerve-wracking for the truck driver.

“The key is for everyone to be on the same wavelength. That way the risk of an incident and injury can be averted.”

Here are Centurion’s top 5 tips to help motorists and caravaners when passing a road train.

Overtaking a road train:

Lights: keep your lights on so your car / caravan can be clearly seen especially if it’s dusty or overcast conditions.

Patience: Passing a 50 meter road train can take as much as 60 seconds so be patient and pick the right time. Make sure that there’s nothing coming in the other direction and you have maximum visibility of the road ahead.

Positioning: If you are going to overtake a road train you’ll need to give yourself plenty of space. Position your vehicle so you can see any oncoming traffic and so the road train driver can see you. If you’re too close you won’t be able to see oncoming traffic.

Indicate: If you want to pass, keep your right hand blinker on to let the truckie know.

Communicate: If you have a UHF radio then radio through on Channel 40. Identify the truck and the direction they are heading and general location – e.g. Caravan calling Centurion truck northbound on Great Northern Highway north of Newman, and ask if it is clear to pass.

Pass: When everything is clear accelerate at a safe and consistent speed and pass. And remember it’s always good to acknowledge when people do the right things with a wave and a smile.

Centurions Top 3 Tips for motorists / caravaners being over taken by a road train:

Speed: If you are about to be overtaken by a road train maintain a consistent speed, don’t break or slowdown, and definitely don’t speed up. The driver will time their pass based on your speed so keeping it steady will ensure they can pass safely.

Signal: Remember road trains can be longer than 50 meters making it difficult for them to judge when they are clear of your vehicle after overtaking. Let the road train know when they can pull in after the manoeuvre with a flash of your headlights. It’s a simple courtesy and will help everyone get along on their long journey

“It’s about everyone doing the right thing on our roads. By understanding what to do, being patient and being courteous we’ll all arrive at our destination safely,” said Mr Cardaci.

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Local Member for the Pilbara, Brendon Grylls, and Executive Chairman of the CFC Group, the parent company of Centurion, Philip Cardaci, officially opened the facility at a breakfast event on 13 November.

The company, which first started delivering to Karratha in 1968, has a long history of servicing both the businesses and people of the City.

The company was founded by brothers Frank and Carl Cardaci in the late 1960’s after they purchased a solitary truck. The first load they delivered was to Karratha the same year.

Nearly 50 years later Centurion has grown from a one truck company into the full logistics solution provider it is today with the City of Karratha remaining central to its future growth plans.

Centurion now provides transport, logistics, supply base and warehousing capabilities in the region.

According to Centurion Executive General Manager Justin Cardaci, the history of the company and Karratha are inextricably linked.

“Karratha has been part of this company from the start. We’ve been involved in every major infrastructure project in the area.

“Over the years we’ve transported critical infrastructure for the City and partnered with companies that construct and then operate the vast projects that underpin the local economy.”

“Whether it be equipment or parts for multi-billion dollar projects, or consumer goods the likely hood is that it will have arrived here via one of Centurions trucks or refrigerated units.”

Mr Cardaci said the new facility would help Centurion service the businesses and people of the city as it grows in the years to come.

“We now have the capability to better service our local customers by improved throughput and turnaround at the Depot.

“Basically as soon as something arrives we can turn it around quicker and get it delivered to its end destination in a shorter time frame.”

Mr Cardaci said that building relationships with local businesses and listening to them no matter how big or small they may be was a key ingredient for the company’s growth.

“We hope we can continue to offer value locally and the opening of this facility demonstrates our continued commitment to the City of Karratha.

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