What is the debt even for??
A freight carrier buys all of the rolling stock it "owns" on credit, so there is a continual debt there. Even if they lease tractors and trailers there is a steady debt load.
And consider the fuel bill every day. Say a truck uses 200 gallons of fuel each day. 200 gallons at an average cost of $3.80 a gallon is $760. Multiply that by 10,000 trucks and you get $7,600,000 in daily fuel expenses. I doubt any carrier is paying cash for fuel, especially at that daily amount, so that is also financed.
The fuel costs alone are something that boggles the mind.
Trucks and trailers may be well built, but still require maintenance and repairs, and that also consumes a chunk of change. Whether YRC has their own staff for maintenance and repair, farms it out, or uses a combination of in house and outsourced maintenance and repair, it still will cost a few bucks.
Keep in mind the daily tire bill too.
It is mentioned here that YRC likely does not own the facilities it operates out of, so there will also be monthly real estate lease expenses.
Add to that multimillion dollar liability insurance policies on all their trucks and trailers, freight insurance, and other insurance costs.
Don't forget the office staff, and office supplies, computers, software licensing, the list goes on.
So you see, the daily monetary needs of any large company are such that carrying a daily debt load goes with the territory. And when management loses control of keeping the revenue income higher than the daily debt load, things get ugly in a hurry.