NTSB: Trucker had little sleep before wreck that killed 7 kids

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/02/03/bus.crash/index.html

The truck driver who plowed into a car near Lake Butler, Florida, on January 25 killing seven children in a fiery crash had little sleep in the 34 hours before the wreck, investigators revealed Friday.

"Except for a short nap, he was awake for 34 hours, but I'm not prepared to tell you whether or not he was exceeding the allowable hours of service," said David Rayburn, a National Transportation Safety Board investigator.

The truck driver, 31-year-old Alvin Wilkerson, of Jacksonville, Florida, has not cooperated with NTSB investigators on the advice of his attorney, Rayburn said. Investigators were able to determine he had been awake for an inordinate amount of time by examining records and interviewing many people. (Read about the crash)

"We know that he was doing something almost continuously during those hours that he couldn't have been doing if he was asleep," Rayburn said at a news conference, without elaborating.

And does anyone remember this? Oh and if I remember right, one of the big pushers on this was Wal-Mart.

Bush trims restrictions on truckers.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002446731_truckrule20.html

The Bush administration yesterday permanently relaxed rules governing how many hours each day truckers may spend behind the wheel, issuing regulations that would allow drivers to continue spending 11 hours a day on the road in a move denounced by consumer-safety advocates.

The Transportation Department said the new rules would improve highway safety because they also shorten a trucker's overall workday and increase required rest periods between shifts. But consumer advocates said the rules were a giveaway to the trucking industry and a step backward.

The rules are similar to those adopted by the Bush administration in 2003, which were challenged by safety advocates who won a federal court ruling in July setting them aside. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, which regulates trucking, justified yesterday's action reinstating the rules by pointing to new research.

"The court did not require us to write a stricter rule," said the agency's administrator, Annette Sandberg, who argued that the agency lost the case on technical grounds for not having scientific justifications. Since then, she said, the agency conducted more research, outfitting rigs with video cameras, motion detectors and instrumentation to monitor driver fatigue, sleep and hours of work.

The rules, which take effect Oct. 1, allow 11 hours of driving in a single stretch, up from the 10-hour limit that had been in effect until 2003. The new regulations would allow truckers to drive up to 77 hours a week, up from 60.

And a court struck down Bush's ruling.

Court Ruling to Block Truckers’ “Hours of Service” Rule is Sweeping Victory for Highway Safety


http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=1751

WASHINGON, D.C. – In a major victory for the safety of motorists and truck drivers, a federal court on Friday unanimously struck down a Bush administration regulation that increased both the consecutive hours and the weekly hours that truck drivers are permitted to drive without rest.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) failed to consider the effect of the new rules on the health of truck drivers – as it is required to do under law. The three-judge panel also expressed grave doubt that any of the challenged aspects of the agency’s regulation could survive scrutiny. The court ordered the agency to revise its regulation in a manner consistent with the court’s opinion.

“This is a sweeping victory for the safety of not only truck drivers but for the motoring public as well,” said Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook. “Tired truck drivers are a major danger on our highways, and this rule was a formula for more deaths and injuries. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration ignored its mission and approved a standard that violates its own statute.”

Public Citizen, along with Parents Against Tired Truckers and Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways, challenged the rule promulgated by the Bush administration in April 2003, after first suing the agency in 2002 for not issuing five truck-safety regulations proposed under the Clinton administration in 2000. The FMCSA agreed to issue the “hours of service” rule after the first suit but significantly revised the original, proposed standard. The case was argued by Public Citizen Litigation Group attorney Bonnie Robin-Vergeer. Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety filed an amicus brief on the winning issue of driver health.

[LiberalinNC]

1. The entire situation is just sad, very sad - and then having the

grandfather die, just adds more pain.

This is why I hate driving to Fl from NC - the truck drivers scare the heck out of me - as do the crazy drivers in S. FL ;)

[Critters2]

3. Interstate 80

in the Midwest is really dangerous these days, with truckers sitting on your ass for miles. I figure there'll be more accidents like this. Not that Bushco cares.

[LostinVA]

17. 81 through Virginia is like this, too -- I hate driving it

[AngryAmish]

2. Big problems with truckers

Funny thing is big trucking companies have really cracked down on their drivers hours of service (ie making sure they are not over-time). Why? Getting hit with a few huge judgments helps to focus the mind that one should have drivers awake while driving. But owner-operators and smaller companies still have a problem.

[jarab]

7. Big problem for this trucker if he can't

prove he spent some meaasurable time in the sleeper (when on the road) ... and it looks like there's evidence he could not have been in two places at one time.

...O...

[m0nkeyneck]

23. you would think the trucker would want to...

prove to himself that he's had enough sleep.

[1monster]

4. I knew it. That was the third big rig accident in a week in this area,

and another horrific accident on I-95 about a month and a half ago took the lives of two college girls and seriously injured (and maimed) a college male.

People were discussing it and asking why there were so many big rig accidents lately. I said it was lack of sleep and driving too many hours due to the relaxed rules on trucking hours.

[bperci108]

10. A more accurate answer...

Is there are simply more and more trucks on the road (and more cars too.)

Add cellphones, dvd players, GPS screens, music players of all sorts and the other things I listed below, along with more inexperienced drivers on the road (and many older drivers who should no longer hold a licence) and the current situation is the result.

The HOS regulations have little to do with it.

Speaking from personal experience, I'm far more rested under the new regs than the old. I've had many others tell me the same thing.

YMMV.

[DoYouEverWonder]

11. What does any of that have to do with the fact

that this driver had been driving for almost 34 hours with little sleep despite the regulations. Had a clear unobstructed view of the road and never even noticed the stopped school bus before he plowed into the van that was stopped behind the bus killing everyone inside of it and injuring all of the kids on the bus?

[bperci108]

14. Some here want to blame the regulation change...

for his being tired and unsafe.

This guy ignored the regs and common sense and will face serious consequenses for doing so.

I'm just tired of the truckers being made pariahs by the general public for dubious reasons.

If you will notice:

"...People were discussing it and asking why there were so many big rig accidents lately. I said it was lack of sleep and driving too many hours due to the relaxed rules on trucking hours."

...was what I was responding to, not the fact that an unsafe driver killed a whole family with his negligence.




Okay...it's a pet peeve of mine. My apologies. :eyes:

[DoYouEverWonder]

18. Sorry, I'm a bit touchy about this one

I've met this family and they are best friends with one of my employees. Two days before these kids got killed we were at my employees house celebrating her wedding. Some of the kids were at the party.

[bperci108]

22. How sad.

My condolences to you and yours. :grouphug:


My point was that the HOS regulation change is irrelevant here and to point to it as a "problem", especially in the case of this tragedy, is misguided and wrong.

The responsibility here lies solely with the driver who was negligent, and goes no further.

IOW - no matter how big a corporate whore and willing stooge Duhbya is, he carries no blame here. For a thousand other things, perhaps; but not this time.

[AngryAmish]

19. I think the rate of trucking accidents are going down

But I could be wrong

[brentspeak]

20. While I am scared of trucks, I appreciate the work you guys do

My question is: Do companies (or whoever) put unfair deadlines on you guys? Like, 'I don't care if you're starting out 1,000 miles away -- you better be here tomorrow at 4 pm!"

[bperci108]

21. Some do, for sure...

But not mine. The standing order at my company is "Do not operate unsafe or illegally for any reason whatsoever".

No deadline or delivery is worth taking the chance of causing an accident, injury or death, but not all companies see it that way. I've worked for some like that in the past, but never again.

Organizing the drivers nationwide into One Big Union would help put a stop to some of the abuses and unsafe demands, but that's another post and discussion. ;)


Personally, I do this beacause I like to do it; I don't have to.

But many don't have the luxury of an education like I do to be able to go do something else.

Add to this the fact that the roads are adding more unskilled and inexperienced drivers (in big trucks and cars) all the time; there's no way to prevent that- the railroads are dying, the nation is growing (and demanding more goods and services) and the Great American Car Culture grows like a virus out through the sprawling suburbials...

[RamboLiberal]

5. And as usual looks like Bushie went around the courts

Agency keeps rule letting truckers drive 11-hour shifts
By BOB DART
Cox News Service
Monday, August 22, 2005

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration declined to downshift Friday on the number of hours a long-haul trucker can drive without rest, and drew immediate criticism from highway safety activists.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) announced new "hours of service" regulations on the trucking industry, but left intact a controversial, two-year-old provision allowing drivers to stay on the road 11 hours without a required rest.

"This agency is still asleep at the wheel," said Jackie Gillan, vice president of Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, a coalition of consumer, health, medical and safety groups and insurance companies.

Noting that a federal court in 2003 stopped the agency's original move to increase a 10-hour driving limit that had been in effect for decades, Gillan said, "They've taken the rule that was rejected by the court and repackaged it as something new and different."

The administration "has failed once again to protect the health and safety of working truck drivers and American families on our roads and highways," she charged.

http://www.western-star.com/hp/content/shared/news/nation/stories/08/20TIRED_TRUCKERS.html

[Lorien]

6. There it is. That change to the rules came to mind the moment I saw

the headline. Terrible, and so very sad. It could possibly have been provided if common sense, not lobbyists, had prevailed in Washington.

There was a horrible crash in Ohio just a few years ago when a trucker fell asleep at the wheel and drove in to stopped traffic on the interstate. I think 21 people were killed. :-(

[Raine]

8. Awful

the whole thing is so sad.

[bperci108]

9. Speaking from experience.. (I drive one)

The hours of service change was an improvement over the old rules....period. It's much more in tune with the human body's natural circadian rhythms.

Parents Against Tired Truckers and Citizens for Reliable...(insert selfserving bullshit here) would better spend their time getting the unsafe car and pickup drivers off of the roads; I see far, far, FAR more unsafe driving by the folks in the four-wheelers than the big trucks.

Truth be told, both groups are likely astroturf organizations funded by the trucking lobby itself-most of the LTL carriers hate the new regs.

What I see on the road every single day (and by no means an exhaustive list!): Women putting on makeup at 70 mph, people eating a triple whopper while driving, kids out of car seats romping in the backseat, and the ubiquitous cellphones. Those damned things are the cause of more accidents than you'd think or could easily count. :mad:


Professional drivers are used to being scapegoats for the ills of the driving public; but if there was ever a general strike by us due to the endless shit-storm flung at us by bloviating nitwits, political blame-dispersal professionals, self-proclaimed "eckspurts", and some genuinely well-meaning, but misguided regular folks, there would be several million cold, naked, unemployed, hungry and generally deprived Americans.

Be careful what you wish for; you just might get it.

:rant:

{rant mode off}

Okay...pile on. :spank:

[alphafemale]

12. 4-wheelers CAN do some dum shit.

Seriously folk. This poster is right.
18-Wheelers are professionals and I'd say 95% of them act that way.

But this particular case does seem to be a case where a small company trying to keep trucks on the road, which brought on a lack of sleep by someone wishing to stay employed, brought on a micro-nap which brought on anguish.

[1monster]

24. Perhaps, but it is easy to spot big rig drivers on the Northeast Florida

stretch of I-95 driving in a very unprofessional manner. I was on I-95 just two days after the seven children and saw on big rig move from the right hand lane to the center lane and then sit less than two feet from the bumper of the car in front of it for about two miles.

When it finally dawned on the truck driver that the car in front was not going to be intimidated into either breaking the speed limit or dodging into traffic in either the right or far left lane, he moved back into the right lane.

I'd like to say that kind of behavior is the exception rather than the rule, but it would not be true. I avoid I-95 like the plague because of the many near misses I have seen and had on that Interstate.

That is not to say that noncommercial drivers don't do some really stupid things too, but in a big rig accident, there is always tremendous damage and quite often fatalities.

And yes, there are plenty of big rig accidents that are caused by a noncommercil driver, such as another one on that same stretch of highways just over a week ago... a car cut off a tanker carrying some kind of explosive fluid, the trucker swerved to avoid hitting it and jackknifed. The resulting fire closed down I-95 for hours. Fortunately, the driver was out of the hospital the next day and no one else was hurt. I applaud his driving abilities and actions which kept the accident from being a terrible tragedy.

[woodsprite]

13. You are so right! We look at the truckers as our friends on the

road and everyone else as a possible "enemy combatant". We don't drive a tractor trailer, but we do have a fifthwheel we take out and people see something that big coming and they gotta get ahead of you. And it's not like it accidental, it's a conscious decision. People drive like idiots. We moved from where we had been living to avoid the I-95 slolom in the morning to get to work. It's like everyone thinks 95 is the minimum speed, not the name of the road.

My Dad was a trucker for several years and would trust them above anyone else on the road too.

OK - rant off. ;)

[KittyWampus]

15. recommended. Coal Mining & Trucking. Thought The Days Of

Triangle Shirt Factory were over.

Edit- I'm referring to attempts to weaken safety regulations.

It'd be nice if we started using rail to deliver goods. Trucks tear up our roadways. Rail uses less petroleum.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

16. K&R. Thanks for spelling out!