The New CSA 2010 rules can end your carer !

I have a big problem that is going to effect every driver on the road in the near future. The problem is CSA 2010. These new rules have pretty much destroyed my driving carer. Before I tell you what happened let me give you a little of my back ground. I am now 57 years old. In the early 1970′s I drove a truck for a while but did not stay with it but for a year or two. For those of you old enough to remember that far back you will know that was before CDL’s all that was need then was a chauffeurs license to drive a truck. In 1995 I owned my own custom cabinet business. I was doing ok but I needed to do better that just ok so I went to driving school and got my CDL’s and started driving a truck again.

Since I got my CDL’s in 1995 I have never had any moving violations of any kind. No speeding tickets, no accidents, no nothing! In the past 12 years I have only had 3 jobs. In 1999 I started working for a trucking company pulling flatbed hauling PVC pipe. I worked there for 3 years until the company lost their contract with the pipe company and went out of business in 2002. At that time I thought I was ready to be an owner operator so I bought a Mack truck, a 53′ dry van and a 48′ flatbed. I managed to keep the Mack on the road for 3 years until the cost of fuel and maintenance was so much that I sold the truck and equipment in 2005. On income tax day 04/15/2005 I went to work for my present company. One month later (my wife had already went to school and got her CDL’s) joined me and we became team drivers. This company is a refrigerated carrier and we drove all of the 48 states staying out for a month at a time and only coming home for 3 days. During our 6 years with this company we gave our best to the company. We never refused a load. We always did our best to get the load delivered on time. Most important we never had any accidents or moving violations!

Ok, here’s what happened. On 02/17/2011 we had picked up a trailer from one of our drivers that had broke down. We met the other driver in Breezwood, Pa. give him our empty and took his loaded trailer. The load had to deliver the next day in Wisconsin and had already been re-scheduled. For those of you that have been driving for a while will know how a dispatcher will drop hints. They can’t tell you to do anything illegal but they will say things like, We need to do what ever it takes to make sure this load gets delivered on time. Being team drivers we didn’t have to worry too much about running out of hours. As we were driving across I80 in Indiana my wife was driving and she became very Ill. She then pulled over on the shoulder and wanted to lay down for a few minutes. I told her it was unsafe to set on the shoulder like this but she couldn’t continue right then. So to get off the shoulder I said I would drive to the next service plaza and stop. About 10 miles down the road I looked in my mirror and saw blue lights. We were stopped by a Indiana state trooper.



When the trooper came up to the truck he told me he stopped me for speeding. The speed limit along I80 in Indiana is 65 mph. I informed the officer that it was impossible for me to go over 65 mph because our truck had a governor and was set at 65 mph. He told me not to worry he was not going to write me a speeding ticket but he did do a level 3 DOT inspection. Our truck was equipped with electronic logs. I tried to explain to the officer about the circumstances as to why I was driving and my wife was logged on as driving but of course it did no good. I committed only one illegal act but was given two violations and citations. I was given a ticket for driving over my 14 hours and a ticket or a falsified log since I was logged in the sleeper but I was driving. Now don’t get me wrong here. I’m not trying to say I did not do anything wrong. Although I do feel the one 14 hour rule violation should have been enough. Oh, and he did give me a warning ticket for driving 1-5 mph over the speed limit.



Did I do something wrong? Yes I did. But did I deserve what happened to my wife and I? Here’s where the new CSA 2010 rules comes in. Under these new rules ANY violations you receive in a DOT inspection goes on not only your record for 3 years but it also goes on the company you work for safety record for 2 years. You and your company gets points on your record for each and every violation. Even if it was only a warning! If you get a warning ticket for speeding you will get points on your safety record just as if you had gotten a speeding ticket and of course the company’s safety record gets the points too. These points you receive will go on you PSP for 3 years. If you want to go to work for another company they can pull your PSP see how many violations you’ve had and choose to hire you or not. The PSP is the Pre Screen Employment record.


After 6 years of dedicated service, 12 years with a completely clean driving record my driving carer is over because of these new rules. Everyone wants the roads to be safe but it seems to me that the DOT wants every driver and every trucking company to be perfect. Guess what DOT, there are no perfect people or companies in the world! You can’t make the law so black and white. The law needs to allow for certain circumstances. Looking at my situation. I could have choose to stay on the shoulder of the interstate until my wife felt better but how safe would that have been? It was February the roads were still icy! Not to mention the parking ticket we would have gotten for sitting there. Looking back I guess we should have done that and just stayed there and kept our fingers crossed that we didn’t get hit by another truck or car. Our job would have probably survived a parking ticket.


As a result of what happened on 02/17/2011 in Indiana my wife and I were suspended from our job that we've had for 6 years. We were suspended for 12 months. We can not survive 12 months without a job. So I ask DOT and everyone else out there is this right? Or are these new rules putting good drivers out of a job because the trucking companies are afraid of what DOT will do to them if they keep drivers employed if they get a violaton?