The Atlantic coast has been well behaved this year.
Five named storms, no hurricanes, and the latest start to hurricane activity of the satellite era. But don’t cheer so loudly, freight networks still found plenty of ways to fall over without the weather’s help.
Carriers that looked rock solid in January were rejecting loads by March. Spot rates jumped. A strait that most supply chain teams weren’t discussing shut down for months and pushed up the cost of resins, fertilizer, and fuel.
By summer, a lot of “resilient” networks were tested… and not many passed.
That’s the problem.
Supply chain resilience isn’t the binder, the slide, or the annual exercise where everyone agrees they have backup options. It’s whether another carrier can take the lane, whether another mode can move the freight, and whether those options are ready before the phones start lighting up.
KBX Logistics™ spends a lot of time in that uncomfortable space between “we have a plan” and “the plan works.”
This piece looks at 2026. What stronger networks had in place heading into the year, and why hoping the next disruption lands somewhere else is still an inefficient way to run a supply chain.
If the Storms Haven’t Come, What Actually Broke Freight Networks in 2026?
First, trucks simply disappeared.
FTI Consulting tracked capacity tightening faster than at any point since 2022 as carriers that had spent years hanging on finally folded. By midyear, dry van spot rates hit $3.00 a mile with fuel, even though volumes never exploded. Everyone watching demand was staring at the wrong side of the equation.
Then Washington took another bite. FMCSA’s non-domiciled CDL rule narrowed eligibility and forced states to revisit licenses already issued. Suddenly, some of the cheapest capacity didn’t look quite so cheap.
Then came Hormuz. Months of restricted traffic through the strait repriced resins, fertilizer, fuel, and chemical feedstocks far beyond the Gulf.
Three different problems. One very expensive weakness: networks built with nowhere else to go.
Where Does a Weak Network Show Up First?
Usually, in the routing guide.
One carrier passes, then another, and the load keeps sliding down the list until the names run out. At that point, whatever rate you negotiated during bid season is beside the point. You’re buying capacity at today’s price.
A lot of shippers learned that lesson this spring. J.B. Hunt’s Spencer Frazier said routing guides set during bid season started unraveling almost immediately, while ACT Research put spot rates 43% above the prior year versus 13% for contract. Enough rejected loads, and the annual transportation budget starts changing one tender at a time.
Carrier depth gives you room before you get there. Four names on a lane can vanish quickly. A broad pool of vetted truckload capacity already connected and tendering gives operations somewhere else to turn before spot becomes the default.
What Does Resilience Look Like When Truckload Isn’t Enough?
Once the whole truck market tightens, having more names to call only gets you so far.
Supply chain resilience means the freight has another way out. Shippers leaned on that option in 2026, with intermodal volume reaching 6.4 million units through the first 23 weeks as freight shifted from truck to rail when rates climbed.
Of course, rail isn’t something you discover during one bad day. You need the relationships, equipment, and know-how to make the handoff before the lane gets ugly.
KBX put the same thinking to work when Hurricane Milton threatened a 15,180-pound UPS enclosure headed for DEPCOM Power in Puerto Rico. We moved it by RoRo, kept another route ready, and delivered on time.
How Do You Build Supply Chain Resilience Before the Next Disruption Instead of After?
You build it before anyone is forwarding weather alerts, chasing rejected tenders, or asking finance how much pain is left in the budget.
CSCMP’s State of Logistics Report makes the bigger point: disruption has become part of running the network. Resilience, then, is mostly about how many useful options you’ve already paid attention to before the obvious one disappears.
- Know Who Can Really Cover the Lane: Four carriers on paper can turn into one carrier awfully fast. Count the vetted, connected carriers that are actually tendering freight, because names in a bid file won’t rescue a load during crunch time.
- Build Another Way to Move It: Long-haul freight shouldn’t have one answer forever. Rail and intermodal take relationships, equipment, and planning, which is precisely why you want them ready before truckload rates start misbehaving.
- Leave Room for the Market to Be Annoying: January pricing has a habit of looking very optimistic by June. Contracts should expect repricing, capacity changes, and the occasional market tantrum instead of treating each one like a surprise.
- Find the Problem While It’s Still Cheap: Visibility is reaction time. Sphera found companies needed 8.7 hours to notice a disruption and more than 40 to understand the financial damage. Forty hours gives a small problem plenty of room to develop ambition.
Proxima found 72% of CEOs would accept supplier cost increases above 10% to guarantee resilience. They’re paying for options. More carriers, more modes, better visibility, and fewer frantic conversations after the network has already run out of places to go.
So, What Should Your Network Be Able to Do When Plan A Fails?
At KBX, our answer is pretty simple: it should have somewhere else to go.
We learned that inside Koch, moving chemicals, fuels, and building products for operations that can’t shrug off a missed truck. Over time, that meant building real carrier depth, multiple modes, and enough visibility to change course before a problem starts running the day.
Shippers can plug into that same structure now.
Truckload, rail and intermodal, project cargo, global forwarding, bulk, and specialized freight all sit under one operating model. We manage more than 8,000 loads a day and $2.5 billion in freight, so rerouting, rethinking a lane, or changing modes isn’t a fire drill. It’s part of the job.
If you’re not sure how much room your network really has? Bring us your lanes. Better to find out now than let the next bad week do the audit.