For the remainder of the year, and throughout 2010, we will monitor and inform you of developments with Comprehensive Safety Analysis 2010, or CSA 2010.
This new FMCSA safety program is currently being pilot-tested to replace the existing SafeStat and safety fitness rating systems. CSA 2010 introduces a new enforcement and compliance model that allows FMCSA and its State partners to contact a larger number of carriers earlier in order to address safety problems before crashes occur. When the program is fully rolled out by the end of 2010, FMCSA will have a new nationwide system for making the roads safer for motor carriers and the public.
The closer we get to the implementation of the new program, the more we are being presented with updates from a variety of sources. At the Ohio Trucking Association's Annual Convention in Wheeling, WV, Jeff Davis, VP of Safety and Human Resources for Jet Express, Inc., gave a comprehensive CSA 2010 presentation to all attendees. At the September Safety Management Council meeting of the Indiana Motor Truck Association, Greg Shipman of Vertical Alliance Group gave an update on CSA 2010 and spoke about his company's new website, http://www.csa2010.com/, designed to help motor carriers learn about the FMCSA's new initiative.
Over the course of the coming months, The Dispatch will provide information and updates as the development of CSA 2010 continues, including articles and material from various professionals throughout the industry.
For information on CSA 2010 directly from FMCSA, visit the site at www.fmcsa.dot.gov/safety-security/csa2010/home.htm. CSA 2010 Updates appear every Wednesday in the FMCSA News Summary.
Driving Ambition is a premier CDL truck driver staffing company serving Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Since 2001, we have specialized in matching safe, experienced CDL drivers for our customers and great job opportunities for our professional truck drivers.
Our commitment to safety and building solid working relationships with both customers and CDL drivers has allowed us to earn an unparalleled reputation with our Proven Drivers and Exceptional Service.
Click here to view the short film, produced in Wales, UK, that has circulated over the internet the past couple months. The film shows the devastating consequences of Driving While Texting (DWT) and has helped to ignite the overwhelming interest in creating a ban for the practice.
Chief Inspector John Pavett from Gwent Police Roads Policing Unit hopes the serious message in this film will hit home to viewers: "Seeing a scenario, like [this] one, played out right before your eyes makes you realize how extremely dangerous it can be and what devastating consequences it can have. I hope that after watching this film motorists will think twice before picking up their mobile phone when behind the wheel and realize that a quick reply to a text message or answering a phone call is never worth putting theirs and other people's lives at risk."
Driving Ambition is a premier CDL truck driver staffing company serving Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Since 2001, we have specialized in matching safe, experienced CDL drivers for our customers and great job opportunities for our professional truck drivers.
Our commitment to safety and building solid working relationships with both customers and CDL drivers has allowed us to earn an unparalleled reputation with our Proven Drivers and Exceptional Service.
The membership of the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) has enacted a new policy encouraging every state to ban texting behind the wheel for all drivers. GHSA Members are appointed by their governors to lead state highway safety agencies.
According to GHSA Chairman Vernon F. Betkey Jr., "The action by the GHSA membership is based on the fact that texting while driving is indisputably a distraction and a serious highway safety problem. If every state passes a texting ban, it will send a message to the public that this dangerous practice is unacceptable. We can begin to change the culture that has permitted distracted driving." Betkey noted the recent study from the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute influenced the GHSA membership action. That study indicated that a driver who is texting increases crash or near-crash risk by 23 times.
GHSA continues to have concerns about enforcing text messaging bans. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is expected to begin an enforcement demonstration project later this year which the Association fully supports. GHSA is hopeful that U.S. Transportation Secretary LaHood's upcoming summit on distraction and the NHTSA demonstration project will provide a roadmap for developing additional enforcement strategies and countermeasures.
Despite these concerns, GHSA Vice Chairman Lowell Porter is confident that, given all the focus on the issue, effective enforcement solutions are on the horizon. "In the past, there were challenges enforcing seat belt and drunk driving laws. However, the research and highway safety communities collectively worked together and developed successful enforcement programs like Click It or Ticket. I am confident that we can do the same thing with texting bans. GHSA's new policy will help move this process along."
Chairman Betkey noted that this meeting is the first time in a year that GHSA's full membership has met. In that time, texting while driving has gained considerable attention. According to Betkey, "We want to send the strongest message possible about texting behind the wheel-it is dangerous and should not be tolerated."
Cell phone and texting laws are posted online.
GHSA's distracted driving policy is also available.
Investigations have found that tens of thousands of CDL truck drivers remain on the road, despite medical conditions that should disqualify them. Last month reporters found several instances where medically unfit drivers had caused fatal crashes. The driver in one fatal Ohio crash had 27 different prescription drugs in his cab, although none were detected in his blood. His medical certificate had expired just a week earlier.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reported in 2007 that truck drivers' heart attacks or other physical impairments were responsible for some 4,000 serious truck crashes from April 2001 through December 2003, while another 5,000 were caused by drivers falling asleep. Researchers estimate that more than 28 percent of all truckers suffer from sleep apnea to some degree.
Last summer, congressional investigators reported that one out of three medical certificates examined at roadside stops could not be verified -- either the doctors who signed the certificates could not be found or they denied ever conducting an exam claimed by a driver.
Under current law, commercial drivers are required to carry a copy of their medical certificate with them as proof of having passed the exam. But state regulators have no way to verify the information on the document in real time. In Ohio, for instance, commercial driver's licenses are issued by the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, but medical certification is handled by the state Public Utilities Commission. "We have no means to verify a certificate when we have a driver stopped alongside the road for an inspection," said PUC official Milan Orbovich. "We have a big level of concern."
Federal officials say that out of 3.4 million roadside inspections in 2007, there were more than 145,000 citations issued to drivers who did not have a copy of their medical certificate, more than 42,000 who had expired certificates and another 4,300 with improper certificates. Blank medical-certificate cards are easily downloaded from government Web sites, and there are no safeguards to keep a driver from filling out his or her own medical papers. They can pick a doctor's name from the phone book, sign the certificate themselves and look up the medical provider's license number online.
Under rules adopted in January, the FMCSA will require drivers to send a copy of their medical certificates to state driver-licensing agencies. Those agencies will then merge the medical information on an electronic record in the national commercial-driver-license database. This new regulation is to be fully up and running in 2012. The three-year delay is needed to give state DMVs time to set up new recordkeeping and storage systems. Once it's in place, the system will make it much harder for drivers to either falsify exams or "doctor shop" for examiners who will pass over problems that should keep them from behind the wheel of 80,000-pound rigs.
The new system is not foolproof, but it will be a considerable improvement and be safer for both the truckers and the motorists with whom they share the roads.
The FMCSA has released an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM), requesting comments from the industry on whether the agency should require new carrier applicants to pass a safety examination as part of its revised New Entrant Safety Assurance Process. The FMCSA also welcomes comments on other methods to ensure that new carriers are knowledgeable about safety requirements.
The move comes on the heels of the agency's new rule passed in December, which raised the compliance standards for passing new entrant safety audits. Under that rule, a newly registered trucking or bus company will automatically fail its safety audit if it violates any one of 16 essential federal regulations during the 18-month safety monitoring period.
However, in response to the final rule, Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety (Advocates) filed a petition for reconsideration in January 2009, alleging that the FMCSA did not go far enough in terms of safety. In its comments on the proposed rule, Advocates strongly supported a proficiency exam.
In the FMCSA's ANPRM, it asks for information on questions such as the feasibility of establishing a proficiency examination, information about similar types of tests that could serve as models, information on the anticipated impact on new entrants, how such an exam would increase carrier knowledge of the regulations, and others.
The industry must file comments by October 26.
This is part of FMCSA's ongoing effort to ensure that new entrants into the business are prepared to meet their safety responsibilities.
A final rule probably is several years away.
Have you experienced any "sleep disorders, pauses in breathing while asleep, daytime sleepiness, loud snoring?"
This single question is currently the extent of identifying commercial drivers with sleep apnea.
This is why federal safety officials announced last month an aggressive new stance in identifying sleep apnea that would affect CDL drivers.
In a letter to the FMCSA, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recommended that the agency implement a program to identify commercial drivers at high risk for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). The NTSB also recommended that drivers be required to provide evidence that they've been evaluated for OSA and treated if necessary.
The NTSB also wants the FMCSA to distribute guidance to commercial drivers, employers and physicians on identifying and treating OSA.
The FMCSA is already considering a rule to tighten its standards for medical certification of commercial drivers.
Last year, the FMCSA Medical Review Board recommended the FMCSA require screening for OSA for drivers with a Body Mass Index over 30, but the agency has not acted on it.
It is unclear how soon the changes in regulations might take place or how such changes might be received by the trucking industry.
Driving Ambition is a premier CDL truck driver staffing company serving Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Since 2001, we have specialized in matching safe, experienced CDL drivers for our customers and great job opportunities for our professional truck drivers.
Our commitment to safety and building solid working relationships with both customers and CDL drivers has allowed us to earn an unparalleled reputation with our Proven Drivers and Exceptional Service.