Our US bureau chief, Roger Renstrom, has left for a two-month expedition which will take him to places most of us can only dream of. And while he's away, a very capable substitute, Tom Andel, steps in to cover the North American beat for the next few weeks. Tom has been covering materials handling, transportation, distribution, manufacturing and supply chain management for 29 years. He is currently a columnist and blogger on forklifts for Modern Materials Handling and a contributor to Logistics Management. And as you can see from his first story, he has hit the road running.