He’s a big guy with the deep, gruff voice of a man who’s always enjoyed a good ciggie, a smile as wide as Lake Dunstan and an enthusiastic, bellowing laugh. He goes by one of the coolest names around and drives one of the coolest trucks on the road. Craig Little, better known to one and all as Rocket, is the quintessential truckie’s truckie. Third generation in the industry, he lives and breathes trucking, operates with the keenest eye and deftest touch, and loves nothing more than to do the best job he possibly can … A trait that’s clearly part of the man’s character, while probably also having something to do with experience gained in the deep end of just about every area of trucking.

“I’ve had a few jobs in my life …” 48-year-old Rocket says with a laugh. “But I’ve only had one that wasn’t to do with trucks. Pretty much my whole life has been around trucks.”

The Little family history in transport starts mid-century when grandad Robert ‘Bob’ Little owned Waianiwa Transport (head west out of Lorneville, pass through Wallacetown, turn north onto Argyle Otahuti Road, and you’re there). Born in Invercargill, Rocket was raised in Waianiwa until seven.

“Grandad sold to Ryal Bush Transport in the late-1970s or early- 1980s. Of course, Dad worked there, and once the business was sold, Dad became an OD with his father carting logs for Trevor Houston Logging at Waianiwa. Later, we moved to Christchurch, and Dad became an OD for Freight Haulage.”

By the time he was 13, the family had moved to Winton, where Rocket stayed to finish high school and start work – that one and only job outside of trucking – at Craigpine Timber. Before long, though, he’d begin his trucking career behind the wheel of an International S-Line in Ryal Bush colours, where he stayed for a year.

By this time, dad Neville was working for Wilder Transport, one of the many local carriers to emerge from the collapse of Transpac, and Rocket joined him at the Christchurch-based company. “I was 19 when I started driving Dad’s Seddon Atkinson, doing Invercargill-Christchurch three nights per week. That’s where I started with linehaul.”

Rocket left before Wilders “went tits up” in 2001 and made the move to Wilson’s Transport as an OD on stock, based out of the Milton depot. “Most of my jobs have been ‘in the deep end and learn for yourself, you’ll be right’,” Rocket laughs. “By the time I was 27, I had done bulk, freight, stock, logs … covered most of the basics of a general career in transport in a short period,” he says, as he continues …

“I then did a courier run for Mike Chittock, before ending up in Christchurch again, driving Ryan Pullan’s Peterbilt flour tanker – I was 30 when I moved up there to do that and had, obviously, never done tanker work before.” Ryan’s famed Peterbilt 379 is a truck that holds a very special place in Rocket’s heart, a highlight of his career. But all good things come to an end and with changes at Goodman Fielder, Rocket’s time in the big Pete was done.

“I decided I would stop driving after that,” Rocket says. “I was back within a week.”

When it’s in your blood …

Some relief work scratched the itch before Rocket started up with Barry Satherley’s BR Satherley Transport. “Transporters was another thing I hadn’t done! But Barry was a really good teacher. You could always ring him and have him walk you through something. He always said that if we don’t feel comfortable doing a load, he’d rather we told him and he would be happy do it himself. I stayed for five-and-a-half years.”

Going full circle, Rocket’s next move was to Road Metals, “which took me right back to the start with gravel spreading!” After four years or so on the job, the stimulation just wasn’t there anymore and with the arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic, Rocket took a month off. At this point in the journey, it’s worth mentioning that Neville worked for Summerland’s Ross ‘Smiley’ Millard when he had Earthmovers Cromwell years before, so Smiley had known Rocket “since I was a young fella”.

“So, I said to Smiley I’d come do fruit for a month, and he said there’s always a job at Summerland if I want one … so I started there on Ricky’s [Rodgers] old Western Star and stayed on that till I finished after the business was sold.”

And thus, Rocket’s journey into the driver’s seat of Freight Train Heart. “I’ve known Ricky since he was 18. We’ve been mates together with a few others in the South Island scene. November was two years driving with him. I’ve found I don’t like working for big companies … Summerland was big, but Smiley could walk into the yard in Christchurch and know everyone’s name; he knew who you were.

“All of them had their plusses and minuses. The stock side of it for the places you go that you never think of going and the people you meet. But I can’t see myself back on a stock truck. The transporters were a bit of the same because every day, the load and location was different. You know, I spent nearly eight years just going Dunedin-Christchurch and back … I enjoyed that a bit, but I love a job with variety, where every day is different. I don’t like being mundane … Now, it’s cars, concrete, swimming pools, anything. I’ve been and done most things, and here I can have a bit of fun.”

A job with variety that bucks the mundane? That’s made of a close-knit group of good people … who love and drive cool trucks? A man who’s done it all (just about), could barely ask for more.

“I wouldn’t mind driving a loader, though!” As we were saying …