The recent tragic accident that resulted in the injury of actor/comedian Tracy Morgan and the death of comedian James McNair has caused many in the industry and many news outlets to predict that the HOS restart provisions that looked like they might be getting the boot might not ne getting suspended after all. Despite the rumors, the ATA is remaining optimistic, saying that they are “very confident” that the Senate will vote to suspend the restart provisions.
A 21 to 9 vote by the Senate Appropriations Committee was a bipartisan victory and the forecast for success in both the Senate and Congress was looking good, but then reports surfaced claiming that the driver of the truck involved in the accident had been awake for 24 hours.
Walmart, the driver’s employer, claims that to their knowledge the driver was not in violation of hours of service, a claim that has substantial weight, given that they run with electronic logs. According to a preliminary report by the NTSB, the e-log showed that he had 9 hours and 37 minutes of driving time before the accident and had been on duty for 13 hours and 32 minutes, just under the 14 hour maximum.
After the accident and during the media feeding frenzy that followed, it hasn’t seemed to matter much that the previsions that the ATA and others are looking to suspend didn’t prevent this accident – the rules don’t appear to have even been broken. Despite that, there is a worry that lawmakers won’t want to be seen as being lax on safety after such a public tragedy.
According to an article posted on Fleet Owner, the ATA is not only confident that the bill to repeal the restart provisions will pass the Senate, but that if it does pass the Senate, the House will agree to the suspension as well.
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Source: fleetowner, USA Today
“…a worry that lawmakers won’t want to be seen as being lax on safety…”
Bureaucrats making & changing rules for appearances?
Not trying to detract from the tragedy, but the only reason they are making a big stink out of it is because a celebrity was involved. If people choose not to sleep when they are off, you can add or repeal all the rules you want. It won’t make a difference.
As for the restart provision itself…. Holy crap, get rid of it. That has got to be one of the stupidest rules ever. I only work nights and sleep during the day.
Agreed!
Funny you didn’t post what else they found . The hours of service didn’t have anything to do with the accident. He was doing 65 Mph in a construction zone that had a posted speed limit of 45 mph at the time of the crash. And if they want to get rid of anything about the hours of service rules they need to get rid of the 14 hour BS.
Yen they need to get rid of the 14 hr, 34 reset, and the 30 min. Brk.
I think that the entire “24 hours without sleep” charge was just something that the local prosecutor threw against the wall in order to charge the driver with a felony immediately after the accident.
In NJ, the law states “A driver that has been without sleep for 24 hours is considered to be driving recklessly, in the same class as an intoxicated driver. (New Jersey Statues §2C:11-5)” The only thing I heard from the initial reports was that he was charged with not having slept in a 24 hour period…I didn’t hear anyone say that the driver admitted to not having slept in 24 hours.
Here’s a thought….stop telling us when we should be tired, and just let us sleep when we actually are tired!
Yea what a thought Jason! I see so many drivers on elogs sitting in their trucks waiting for this machine to tell them its OK to drive. Then they have to start their 14 hour day because these dispatchers want to get the most out of them. What does sitting for two hours waiting to start your day do to a driver. I think that most drivers given the opportunity would only drive when it was safe for them and the public. But then as with everything else……there are a few morons that ruin it for the rest of us. These morons are the few that give us truckers a bad name. To bad we can’t weed out the few bad ones to get back the good name of truckers.
Exactly …On any given day and time there are probably 20 thousand drivers on “e-logs” on sleeper birth or rat nest …In a casino or truck stop, or 50 thousand drivers loosing “sleep” and time waiting in the no idle zone of your friendly Walmart DC… Or 5 thousand more on sleeper birth waiting to pick up produce… The point, your never going to be able to “regulate” away a accident.. The trucking industry went to hell in a hand basket when it was deemed possible to hire the homeless to live in a truck…
god so loved the world. he blessed it with stupid people. even ones like you….
Please government, please: can’t we all just calm down here and acknowledge – from a lawmaking point of view – that there’s no more reason to pay any attention to this crash than there is to a mass school shooting?
Cannot tell you why, but his truck was parked in Delaware, while he lives in the Atlanta area. That’s how you are up for 24 hours, yet less than 14 hours on duty. More importantly, the Bendix (or whatever) wingman brake system on his WalMart truck never kicked in. No one behind saw any kind of brake lights. Unhooked or faulty product? In time we should know.
We all know that the hours of service and the ridiculous 14 hour rule is what caused this accident and most of the other crashes that involve a tired driver.. Ive been driving 16 years and have driven with different hours of service rules and the 14 hour rule is the worst.. I should be able to stop anytime and take nap and not have it hurt me in any lost time for the day..
I’ve been driving 36 years and this waiting for your 34 restart to mandatory start at a certain time is a bunch of shit because nobody gonna tell me when I take my day off.I can make my restart start when I want and I’m elog.I just drive and do what ever it takes by my rules.If everyone would tell there employers NO more often then we would win back big corporate rulings that favors the government.
I agree Ron we need to start saying NO more often we need to shut down but I know that ain’t going to happen so we all will just keep on getting the shaft.
Want changes in the industry that will actually help the driver? Why not start with your unqualified, incompetent,and poorly trained dispatchers? You know, the ones who make you run overnight with 2-3 hours of sleep, if your lucky. The ones who get an attitude if you don’t do as they say, then they leave you sitting somewhere without a load, and a small check at the end of the week! They need to be held to a better set of standards than what they are! Laws need to be made to help the driver, not to make corporate pockets deeper! And a driver strike should have never been put under the status of economical terrorism!
I used to drive for a company contracted by Walmart, where I was on-call after my 10hr break. I know it says the driver in the article is/was a Walmart employee, but hear me out. At least once or twice a week, they would give me a load as much as 10-14 hours after my 10hr break. For example: I’d be off for 10 hours (7-8 of it being actually asleep), be awake for the next 12, then be expected to work 14. Despite this obvious danger, the management (of the contract company) maintained that they weren’t breaking any laws because I had my 10hr break. On several occasions, I outright refused to work on the grounds that it was unsafe to drive after being awake for 18-24 hours, and they responded by taking away my bonus and threatened to fire me. They finally backed off when I told them I had filed a complaint with OSHA (who ultimately did nothing) for telling me to work when doing so could’ve caused serious injury or death to myself or others.
A company should not be able to tell you to be awake for that long, but it’s also up to the driver to take responsibility and check themselves to know if they’re in good condition to drive (which I had done and will always do). This driver obviously should not have been driving, but perhaps he felt obligated to work despite his fatigue. Which is the more favorable situation: risk everything, drive tired, get paid? Or be safe, don’t drive, get fired? Those are lose-lose questions that no one should ever have to choose between.
These rules are being passed for the next genaration of truck drivers, Drivers that will never know about the freedoms that we got accustomed too. They will accept them hook line and sinker ,and the rest of us will be sitting on the porch sipping tea, and hopefully drawing ss.
Here is how I see it. He is the one who messed up so penalize the rest of us. The only reason the media and everyone is making such a big stink about this is because it was a actor and comedian if was your family it would not have been. Such a big deal to them. So what I am getting at is.
The wrong doers get them off the road and leave us the ones who has been out here for YEARS AND YEARS and never had a speeding ticket or any other ticket the HE’LL alone.
People need to understand that if a person breaks the rules it doesn’t matter what the rules are. The HOS changes should stay.
spoken like a true non driver
FYI I do drive.
there’s a walmart dc in middle town Delaware. what I am interested in. is if the driver was on a 34 hour rest. and if the driver took the reset in the truck at the dc? or if he went to one of the motels there? that long sitting in a parking lot in a truck. is unhealthy for drivers. while meeting the reset rule. fatigue sets in while spending time in a small space baby sitting a computer. that to me is not considered to be rest. rather I consider it to be working. and when the driver of any company heads back to work. they are unknowingly-knowingly driving or work under un healthy conditions. both physically and mentally. so I think if they do suspend the reset rule currently at hand. I think they should require drivers to spend one night of the 34 hour reset in a motel. pretty much forcing the driver to get out of the truck during the reset period to combat fatigue… that to me will help make drivers safer on the road…
Unless you’re proposing the company foot the bill for the motel stay, you can take that idea and stuff it.
No law is going to force me to pay for a motel when I have a perfectly fine truck with an APU & pillow top mattress to keep me comfortable.
I think the 34 hr. Rule needs to be done away with there is nothing safe at all about all the trucks coming out at the same time other traffic is coming out to go to work and that’s. At the beginning of rush hr. Also the 30 min. Brk. Is be like the other drivers were saying I don’t need someone telling me when I’m tired or need to sleep also I agree its time the companies get held accountable for making drivers drive after being up all day. I will refuse to do it and have. Also the dispatchers are kids mine is 23 my youngest son is older they don’t have a clue.