Desperate truckers camped out in their vehicles overnight last night to guarantee a new shipment of roof slate to repair houses damaged by Hurricane Fabian.

But the shipment of 24,000 Dura slate was held up at the docks last night after dockworkers went on strike.

By just after 7 p.m. last night, 15 trucks were parked outside building suppliers SAL in Southampton as their drivers prepared to wait overnight to guarantee they will get a delivery of 1,000 slates each.

It is the first time since the mid-1980s when there was a block shortage that truckers have had to queue through the night for supplies.

SAL's contract sales manager Brian Hollis said at 7 a.m. this morning his company will hand out slips guaranteeing 1,000 slate to the first 24 trucks in line.

He said he could not do that last night because a trucker could have appeared overnight and thought he was first in line, only to discover all the slate had been assigned.

Mr. Hollis said the dock strike leaving the consignment on the Somers Isles unloaded had "thrown a real wrench in the works" and left a lot of disappointed customers.

He had hoped to unload the slate for the truckers last night but now does not know when it will happen.

"It's really unfortunate the guys had to stay out overnight but tomorrow we will try to find out if there is any better way to cope with the huge demand that is out there."

Mr. Hollis said he decided to limit the supply of slate -- which is still selling at the normal price of $3.35 each - to 1,000 per truck to allow contractors to do small jobs and to prevent a single company from hoarding the supply.

Outside SAL last night as the truckers prepared to sleep in their vehicles, they said clients had paid them to stay overnight.

Craig Young, who works from Peter Bromby's trucking firm, said he was charging a dollar a slate - or $252 to one customer who had ordered 252 slates - for waiting all night.

Self-employed trucker John Burnard said: "If we leave now and leave the truck here, when we come back in the morning it will get put to the back of the line."

Chris Osborne of Fast Forward Freight criticised the dockers for striking when Bermuda was facing a crisis to repair damaged buildings.

"Bermuda is in crisis and it is chaos at the docks. We are already behind as it is," he said. "They may have issues but they could sort it out later."