LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Kentucky Truck Plant employees have spent nearly 24 hours on the picket line outside Ford's largest manufacturing plant, a sudden escalation of a nationwide strike that will have far-reaching ripple effects in the industry.

The strike that began Wednesday evening is the latest move by the United Autoworkers union in its negotiations with Ford.

The plant employs about 8,700 hourly workers churning out F-Series Super Duty pickups, a highly profitable model for Ford, as well as the Lincoln Navigator and Ford Expedition full-size SUVs. The vehicles assembled there alone generate $25 billion a year in revenue, UAW President Shawn Fain said.

As of Thursday, the Super Duty pickups were in short supply, relative to the national average supply for new cars, while the Expedition and Navigator SUVs have a bit more cushion, according to figures from Louisville-based Dealer Trade Network, a business that facilitates the trading of new cars among dealerships.

The UAW's decision to take out KTP came suddenly. The union has previously announced additional strike targets in weekly Friday livestream updates.

"It upsets all of us," Kenneth Suschank, an eight-year veteran at KTP, said Thursday. "We're here. We're on the line. We're breaking our bodies down for these CEOs and everybody to be making all this profitable money and lining their pockets, and all we're asking for is a little bit more. And we feel like we deserve it."

The strike started in Dearborn, Michigan about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, when Fain asked for a meeting with Ford executives and demanded updated economic terms from the company, according to sources on both sides of the negotiations. When executives said they had nothing beyond the offer they've already made, Fain said something to effect of, "Well, you've just lost Kentucky Truck Plant."

An hour later, workers in Louisville were walking off the job. On Thursday, Fain hinted at further action against Stellantis, with whom it's also in negotiations.

"Here's to hoping talks at Stellantis today are more productive than Ford yesterday," Fain wrote on X without saying what might happen.

A group of UPS employees joined the strike outside KTP on Thursday morning, one saying it was a "no-brainer" to stand in solidarity in a union fight across town after Ford employees supported their contract negotiation earlier this year.

The union has steadily expanded the strike to more facilities in more states as negotiations continue. The UAW wants pay hikes in the range of 30% to 40% over four years and the restoration of inflation-adjusted wages and healthcare coverage for retirees, among other items.

Fain said in a statement Wednesday that the union is tired of waiting on Ford to deliver a fair contract since the strike against the Detroit plant began Sept. 15.

"If they can't understand that after four weeks, the 8,700 workers shutting down this extremely profitable plant will help them understand it," he said.

In a statement Wednesday, Ford called the UAW's move "grossly irresponsible but unsurprising."

A Ford spokesman said there will be many "ripple effects" of the KTP shutdown, though it's too soon to say how it will play out. Louisville Assembly, or LAP, has only a few days of supply of body panels stamped by KTP, said Brandon Reisinger, UAW Local 862 building chairman at LAP. That means LAP may be unable to operate soon as a result of KTP's shutdown, although LAP isn't on strike.

Striking workers are receiving $500 a week from the union's strike pay fund. In some states, laid-off workers could qualify for state unemployment aid, which, depending on a variety of circumstances, could be less or more than $500 a week.

This story will be updated.

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