590-Strong Truck Convoy Honors Moms, Make-A-Wish Foundation
The event started as a wish for a Make-A-Wish child in 1990.
— -- A 590-strong truck convoy that wove its way through south central Pennsylvania on Sunday is on track to break a Guinness World Record.
The convoy was organized by the Make-A-Wish Foundation in what has become a more than 25-year tradition on Mother’s Day in the Lancaster, Pennsylvania, area.
“A lot of people here and everywhere don’t have a mom to say thanks to in person on Mother’s Day and for a lot of our volunteers, their participation is a way to say thank you [to moms],” Ben Lee, regional director of Make-A-Wish of Philadelphia, northern Delaware and Susquehanna Valley, told ABC News.
The first convoy was held in 1990 when a Make-A-Wish kid had his wish granted of sitting in a big rig truck and calling his sister on a CB radio. Forty trucks came out that first year and the event has grown ever since.
This year, all 590 trucks met the Guinness World Record qualification of weighing at least 11,000 pounds, according to Lee. Make-A-Wish will now have to wait three to four months for Guinness to confirm they broke the current world record of 416 trucks previously set by a group in the Netherlands.
The convoy, which featured one truck driver who had three grandchildren with wishes granted by Make-A-Wish, is also expected to have raised more than $300,000 for the local chapter to grant more wishes.