FMCSA Continues to Work on Revising Hours of Service Rule
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration held a series of sessions to gather public input on the hours of service rules for truckers that are being revised. The fourth session was held Davenport, Iowa on the 25th of January. The first 3 had been held in Arlington, Virginia; Dallas, Texas and El Segundo, California. The FMCSA had invited commercial truckers, trucking companies, owners, operators; truck safety groups, researchers and other people to discuss issues that impact truck safety. These issues include rest time, on duty time, sleeper berth use, loading and unloading times, and others.
Last year, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration reached an agreement with truck safety groups, the Teamsters union and others to revise the Hours of Service rule for truckers. The Bush Administration had set the rules at 11 consecutive hours. The rule had been soundly criticized by truck accident victims and New Jersey truck accident lawyers. The FMCSA promised that it will revise these rules within a period of 9 months. As part of its efforts to revise the rule, the FMCSA held these four public listening sessions to gather input from the public
Lowering the HOS rules is absolutely necessary, but on its own will not be able to tackle the problem of driver fatigue. The FMCSA has not paid any attention to the problem of sleep apnea, which is another contributor to driver fatigue. The NTSB has recognized the role of sleep apnea in trucker fatigue-related accidents, and has recommended mandatory sleep apnea sleeping for truck drivers. However, the FMCSA has failed to act on these recommendations.
