The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) and its members across the United States, Canada and Mexico are aggressively enforcing compliance with commercial vehicle safety regulations, removing high-risk motor carriers from the roads. Since Tuesday the Roadcheck program is placing specific attention on two areas: enforcing compliance with hours-of-service regulations and educating drivers and fleets about preventing driver fatigue; and checking brake system operations and brake adjustment. CVSA members are conducting Level I inspections and recording results for later comparison with past years’ results.
“Consistently, every year we are seeing hours-of-service logbook violations leading by an overwhelming percentage of all driver violations cited – a total of 52.5 percent of all driver out-of-service violations,” said CVSA President David Palmer. “Hours-of-service rules are designed to reduce driver fatigue which can be a contributing factor in many large truck and bus crashes.”
Law enforcement during Roadcheck emphasizes checking driver logbooks and underscores to drivers the importance of maintaining their logbooks, taking breaks, preventing fatigue, and driving without distractions.
“For 25 years, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has joined forces with CVSA to support the world’s largest targeted inspection and enforcement effort aimed at commercial vehicles and their drivers,” said FMCSA Administrator Anne Ferro. “We want to prevent fatigue-related crashes and save lives by enforcing the hours-of-service requirements.”
Another of the top contributing factors in large truck and bus crashes, CVSA said, is insufficient brake system maintenance. They account for a little more than half of the total vehicle out-of-service defects found.
Results from Roadcheck 2012 will be announced August 7 at CVSA’s North American Inspectors Championship in Minneapolis, MN.