Field report: unmarked refrigerated trailer escorted by federal vehicles

An independent journalist conducted three interviews with a long-haul driver who declined to be identified and who has since stopped responding. The driver was familiar with the route and stated that he had never previously seen federal-plate escort vehicles operating without lights or markings on that stretch of highway at any hour.

He approached the convoy from behind at approximately 04:40 local time. The trailer carried no carrier name, no tractor logo, no DOT number. The two sedans, one ahead and one behind the trailer, carried federal plates and were operating without rotating beacons, without standard escort markings, and without communication on the trucker frequencies he was monitoring.

When he closed the gap to the rear sedan it slowed to match his speed, the driver of that sedan signaled him with a flat hand to drop back, and he complied. He continued to follow the convoy from a distance of approximately three hundred meters for the next nineteen kilometers, at which point the convoy turned off the highway onto an unmarked service road and he continued on his route.

He could not see the driver of the trailer. He could not read the trailer's serial plate from his distance. He did not photograph the convoy. The convoy's destination is not known.