Andrew
McEWAN
Born in Adelaide on the 4th of May, 1960, Andrew ‘Andy’ McEwan grew up in Eden Hills. Attending Blackwood High School, Andy was working after school and weekends for Billy Dennison who owned the local fruit and veggie shop, picking up produce from the Adelaide markets and also delivering firewood with Billy.
When he was 17, Andy started at Mile End Fuel Supply, working in the yard and driving an old Leyland delivering mallee roots, firewood, and briquettes around Adelaide. When Andy was 20, he then went to work for Glen Harris at Harris Refrigerated Transport, driving an
International carting produce to Melbourne, Sydney and Perth. He still keeps in contact with Glen and his family to this day.
At age 24, Andy got a job carting produce to and from the Adelaide,
Sydney and Melbourne markets, picking up produce from farms,
carting dog food, ice cream from Colac, Kwikasair freight and anything in between. From here, he went on the Darwin run, driving a Kwikasair Express truck with overnight freight from Adelaide to Darwin and, more often than not, a quick hotshot to the Tanami Gold Mine on the way up.
In 1986, Andy met his wife Megan in Alice Springs. A year later,
Megan moved to Adelaide and they brought a home in Coromandel
Valley where they lived for 7 years and had 2 children, Rhianon and Robert. Triplet girls, Rachel, Shannen and Michelle, were born in 1997 to complete their family.
In 1995, Ken Brown saw Andy in Alice Springs and he was offered a job at Co-Ord Transport, driving road trains with Red North tankers from the rail yard in Alice Springs to Darwin and onto the Tanami Gold Mine, often via Halls Creek. It was on one memorable trip that Andy rang his wife, Megan, from a broken-down phone box in Halls Creek to find out she was having triplets! Andy stayed with Co-Ord Transport until the company was sold out. NT Fuels took over the fuel contract so Andy worked there until 2001. Andy then worked at G&S transport, driving GS300. He loved his time there with the variety of work.
In 2003, he went back to driving fuel tankers with NT Fuels, driving “Rimula”. He stayed on that run until the end of 2020. With the
Tanami Mine fuel contract being awarded every 3 years, Andy was
always offered to work for the new company taking over the contract. During this time, he worked for North Fuels, DirectHaul and, finally, Toll transport. When Toll Transport took over the contract, Andy and
Megan had to move to Darwin. At the end of 2020, Toll proposed to run out of Kununurra. After already moving to Darwin, he didn’t want to move again to Kununurra. Still living in Darwin after finishing at Toll, Andy called around to the Exact Contracting depot and spoke to Greg Rhodes about getting a job at Exact Contracting. Rhodesy said “No
worries, brus! Start tomorrow if you want”. Andy asked if he wanted his resume and Rhodesy replied “I know what you’ve done over the years. Just go and see the girl in the office to sort out the paperwork”.
Andy is still working at Exact Contracting now, having moved back to
Alice Springs. He loves the variety of work there, with plenty of bush work. With no plans to retire, Andy loves his job and the people.
Inducted in 2024
