What Is the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA)?
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is the leading federal government agency regulating commercial motor vehicles.
According to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), the agency’s mission is “To reduce crashes, injuries, and fatalities involving large trucks and buses.” This mission statement underscores the FMCSA’s role in enhancing road safety through stringent regulations and oversight of the commercial transportation industry.
The benefits of the FMCSA’s regulations include improved road safety, reduced accident rates involving CMVs, and enhanced driver health and welfare. These regulations also promote fair competition among carriers by ensuring that all operators adhere to the same safety standards.
Examples of the FMCSA’s work include setting hours-of-service (HOS) regulations that limit the number of hours a commercial driver can operate to prevent fatigue-related accidents, conducting compliance reviews and safety audits of motor carriers, and maintaining the Commercial Driver’s License Information System (CDLIS) to ensure that drivers meet federal standards. Understanding the FMCSA’s role and regulations is crucial for commercial drivers and motor carriers to ensure compliance and contribute to safer roadways.
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Risks to Truckers During Coronavirus Epidemic
Trucking can be a lonely job during the best of circumstances. Drivers spend extended amounts of time away from family and friends while they drive their rigs across long highways. But driving during a pandemic, with all individuals asked to maintain social distancing of 6 feet, creates a whole new level of isolation. Long haul drivers are spending nearly 24 hours a day in their trucks – cooking, sleeping, “relaxing” all done within the confines of their cab.
Truck drivers are keenly aware that if they contract COVID-19, they have the potential to spread it around over the vast geographic area that they travel. They are also aware that without their continuing to work, not only do they not have an income, but ever increasing demand for shipped goods, will not be delivered. As more and more states ask their residents to stay at home, […]
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Feds abandon driver fatigue test, put “millions of lives at risk”
Feds drop another transportation safety rule, scrap sleep disorder testing
In the latest slash to federal regulations, many of which concern public safety, federal transportation agencies have dropped efforts to improve detection of sleep apnea, a breathing disorder linked to driver fatigue and deadly train and truck accidents.
The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) and Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) have moved to leave testing to individual transport and rail companies.
New York’s MTA and some private transportation companies made moves in the last year to test their drivers and engineers for sleep apnea, a sleep disorder linked to deadly crashes. Metro North in New York found that more than 11% of their drivers tested had sleep apnea.
What is sleep apnea? Why should drivers and engineers be tested?
Obstructive sleep apnea is a disorder that causes the throat muscles to relax and close the wind pipe during sleep. […]
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Trucking companies to increase testing for deadly sleep apnea
Truck drivers face high risk for sleep apnea
Truck drivers face high risk for sleep apneaTrucking companies may more frequently screen their drivers for sleep apnea in an effort to combat drowsy driving accidents.
Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a disorder that causes breathing to start and stop during sleep, leading to less restful sleep and increased drowsiness. For drivers, especially truckers, bus drivers, or train engineers, drowsiness can become deadly.
Why test truck drivers for sleep apnea?
Truck drivers’ concern with sleep apnea is twofold. Their profession makes them both more likely to develop sleep apnea, and more at risk of death from its effects.
Driving a truck involves sitting for long periods of time, eating at truck stops along the road, and irregular sleeping schedules. Factors that can contribute to sleep apnea include obesity, smoking, bad diet, […]
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Safety group files suit for tougher trucker training laws
Several groups, including the Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways (CRASH), and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters filed suit against the DOT and the U.S. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), seeking stiffer rules for training entry-level truck drivers.
Bloomberg reported that regulators have missed deadlines set by two laws passed by Congress since 1991. According to the article, the FMSCA issued a rule in 2004 that only requires 10 hours of classroom work on such topics as driver wellness and hours of service. The watchdog groups say that rule is inadequate, because it doesn’t require any training for entry-level drivers on how to operate commercial vehicles, according to the complaint.
In 2012, Congress passed a second law (the “Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act” also known as MAP-21) requiring the DOT to issue the entry-level training rule, […]
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Fatal truck crashes becoming a common occurrence
There were 3,921 fatalities and 104,000 injuries from truck crashes in 2012, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). That’s over ten fatal crashes and over 284 injuries a day. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) reported that fatal truck crashes were up over 18% between 2009 and 2012, although the annual distance trucks travel on the highway is down 2.67% and the number of trucks is down 2.86%.
A recent story by NBC News talked about the surge in truck accidents and lack of public outcry. Fatal truck accidents are all too common, averaging nearly 11 times every single day in this country, killing nearly 4,000 people each year, and injuring more than 100,000, according to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA).
The NBC report likened those numbers to a commuter jet crashing every single week of the year, […]
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