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For many years, interstate truck drivers have referred to the driver logs required by federal law as “comic books.” Falsification of logs has been so common that many drivers kept two sets of logs, one for their own use and another to show to inspectors. As a trucking accident trial attorney, I have spent many hours ferreting out the misrepresentations, using loading dock tickets, fuel receipts, etc., to recreate an honest timeline. Once, when I established in deposition that a log was a complete bundle of lies, and that the trucker had been driving 20 of the previous 24 hours before he ran over a family and killed their son, the truck driver broke down and cried.

Though the technology has long been available, the trucking industry has been slow to accept a requirement of electronic on board recorders, replacing easily falsified paper logs with electronic ones. The current FMCSA rule, which will go into effect June 4, 2012, says that carriers that violate hours of service rules 10 percent of the time, based on single compliance review, must use electronic onboard recorders to track driver hours. It will affect only 5,700 of 500,000 interstate carriers.

Now, however, there is growing acceptance among trucking industry groups of the idea of electronic driver logs. The Truckload Carriers Association, American Trucking Associations, National Private Truck Council, and . National Tank Truck Carriers, and all recently announced support for federal laws and regulations that would require trucking companies to use electronic logging devices to monitor driver hours-of-service. The Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association still opposes mandatory electronic logs.

Of course, the devil is often in the details. As long as there is an economic motivation to cheat, there will be those who find a way to do so. As electronic logging systems become more common, those of us whose job it is to look behind the surface to determine the truth will be required to become more sophisticated about detection of falsified electronic records.
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Tonight, a tractor trailer changing lanes on I-285 west, near Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, struck a Nissan, sending it into a highway guard rail. After hitting the guardrail, the vehicle was then struck by the cab of another tractor-trailer. Newlywed Danielle Holly, 21, was was killed at the scene. Her husband was transported to the trauma center at Grady Memorial Hospital.

One report stated that the first tractor trailer attempted to change lanes in front of the young couple, clipped the car, and sent it into the inner barrier wall. The car bounced back into the traffic lanes where it was struck by a semi which not carrying a load, resulting in what was described as a horrible rollover.

Initial media reports do not identify the trucking company involved.

The root cause of such tragic crashes often lies in mismanagement of safety issues by the trucking company. A poor safety culture flowing from corporate headquarters may lead to tragedy on the highway. In addition to the police investigation and statements of eyewitnesses, proper handling of civil cases arising from such tragedies includes examination of driver logs, operational records, and records of Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration regarding the company’s safety history.
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Driver fatigue is one of the more common causes of large truck crashes. There is no test for fatigue, but when we dig back into the driver’s itinerary it can be deduced.

Every few months we see another technological approach to dealing with driver fatigue. The latest is an app for Apple iPhones and iPads. The company selling the Anti Sleep Pilot App constantly calculates fatigue level, maintains a driver’s alertness, and alarms the driver when it’s time to take a preventative driving break.

Here’s what the company claims:

The app is easily configured; users get started by creating a baseline profile the first time they use the app by completing a short risk assessment test. Factors include age, sex, number of hours worked per week, etc.; a total of 12 questions are evaluated to create a personal risk profile. Before each drive, the app helps the driver determine his or her current fatigue status. During the drive, the app automatically calculates the drivers fatigue level by combining information from the risk profile, his or her status before the trip, and drive data such as time of day and cumulative drive time, which is automatically registered by the iPhone or iPad.

The progression of the user’s fatigue level is displayed on the iPhone screen and a series of light and sound tests are used to break the monotony of driving and maintain the driver’s alertness by engaging in touch taps on the iPhone or iPad screen. The Anti Sleep Pilot App records the reaction time, which is also used as one of the 26 input factors in the calculation of the driver’s fatigue level. Ultimately the app sounds an alarm, alerting the driver to take a preventive rest break when they are about to reach a critical driving-fatigue level, offering the potential to prevent accidents and save thousands of lives each year.

The Anti Sleep Pilot App has a graphical driver fatigue dashboard that displays driving distance, average driving speed, and the progression of the driver’s fatigue level. The application is also integrated with Google Maps, which continuously gives the drivers an overview of their driving range before their next break.

I haven’t tested it, but for $20, iPhone and iPad users who spend long hours behind the wheel may want to give it a shot.
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The impact of economics on trucking safety is insidious.

One thing that turns up with truckers who are witnesses in our cases is the economic squeeze on independent owner operators who try to operate safely in compliance with the rules. Of immediate concern is the fact that shippers pay fuel surcharges to brokers, but the brokers don’t pass all that fuel surcharge along to owner operators who have to pay for the fuel. That cuts the operating margin for owner operator truckers to the bone.

Then their freight prices are undercut by marginal operators who disregard maintenance, use immigrant drivers who will work for peanuts, and cheat like crazy on their driver logs. And when judges who don’t understand trucking issues rule that companies will to ignore the rules can hire trucks and drivers without any semblance of compliance with the FMSCR lease requirements, the door is opened for companies to employ fly-by-night truckers in complete defiance of all safety and financial responsibility rules.

Bad drives out good, and those who are willing to undercut rates by ignoring safety rules can drive out truckers who try to follow the safety regulations.

I hope that the Obama Administration will protect the safety of the traveling public by implementing two measures:

– Require that fuel surcharges be passed on to the operators who actually pay for the fuel.

– Clarify the rules so that when a truck lease is required under the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations, it will be inferred by law even the parties ignored the law and had neither a written nor oral lease.
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The infant child of a young couple from Douglasville, my hometown, has died of injuries sustained when a tractor trailer ran over their car from the rear on I-75 near Windy Hill Road last Saturday night.

The truck driver, Henry Lipps, 59, from Indiana, has been charged with following too closely and second degree homicide by vehicle.

Police investigators said Lipps did not brake when he approached stalled traffic on a southbound lane of I-75 north of the Windy Hill Road exit. His 18-wheeler crashed into the back of a car in which the child and two adults, Donald Morgan, 25, and Candice Morgan, 24, were riding.

The child was taken to Scottish Rite with critical injuries while the parents were taken to Atlanta Medical Center. Two other adults riding in another car, Ramon Mcelrathbey, 24, and Cornelius Mcelrathbey, 21, were taken to Grady Memorial Hospital.

The tragedy of what happened is obvious. The unanswered question is “why?”

In my trucking accident trial practice in Georgia, I have seen this scenario too often.

In one case, a truck driver from Ohio ran over a family on I-75 a night, and showed Georgia state troopers a driver log that made it appear he was well within his legal hours of operation. But when, in the wrongful death lawsuit, we got all the documents and took his deposition in Ohio, his story slowly unraveled.

In the end, he admitted that his driver log was a complete fabrication. He actually had been driving 20 of the 24 hours immediately before running over a family and killing their child.

When we dug into the company’s records, the evidence was such that a federal judge wrote that the company “turned a blind eye” to habitual safety violations.

When such evidence is uncovered, the potential damages can be increased well beyond a “normal car wreck” tragedy.
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A gruesome week on the Atlanta freeways ended badly when a tractor trailer on I-75 near Windy Hill Road in Cobb County struck several vehicles, caught fire, and send an adult and a toddler in critical condition to area hospitals
According to a report by Alexis Stevens in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, apparently a tractor-trailer struck several vehicles on I-75 near Windy Hill Road around 10 p.m. and caught fire. A child, believed to be between 1 and 2 years old, was to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta in critical condition, while an adult in critical condition was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital trauma center. Apparently several others were injured as well.
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In truck crash litigation in Georgia, I often find that smaller trucking companies have the least focus on enforcing safety rules. For example, we are now preparing for trial a case in which the trucking company repeatedly had been fined for scores of violations of the same basic safety management rules over a three year period prior to the crash in question. That is not unusual.

Starting last year, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration launched a new safety drive called Compliance, Safety, Accountability 2010 (CSA 2010). In an effort to reduce truck accident fatalities, the program is designed to identify dangerous truck drivers, companies with records of negligence and tractor-trailers and other trucks that have unsafe records.

The National Association of Small Trucking Companies sued to block public release of truck safety data online in CSA 2010, claiming that the data is not an accurate reflection of their safety performance and would put them at a competitive disadvantage. The small trucking companies also claimed that federal regulators had failed to follow proper procedures and never put a proper notice in the Federal Register, denying the companies a chance to comment. They also alleged that the agency failed to issue a proper final rule.

Last week, however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia rejected those objections, so that all the detailed trucking safety data may be released online to the public.

In 2006, there were more than 385,000 tractor trailer accidents throughout the United States. They accounted for about 4% of all vehicles involved in a traffic injury and were linked to 8% of all fatal accidents, resulting in at least 4,732 deaths. Federal safety regulators say those numbers, while declining are out of proportion with the number of trucks on the road.
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The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has scheduled a public listening session on its proposal to revise hours-of-service (HOS) rules for commercial truck drivers on February 17, 2011 in Arlington, Virginia.

The agency will also webcast the session live with a forum on its website for comments and questions in order to maximize public participation.

The proposed rule change, which I discussed in this blog about six weeks ago, defines a fault line between the trucking industry, which generally claims asserts the proposed changes would excessively restrict the trucking business in already economically difficult time, and safety advocates who say the changes don’t go far enough in reducing driver fatigue.

According to Transportation Department records, driver fatigue accounts for up to 40 percent of all commercial vehicle crashes.

The hearing will be held at the Crowne Plaza Washington National Airport hotel at 1480 Crystal Drive, Arlington, Virginia 22202. The live webcast may be viewed by going to www.fmcsa.dot.gov. The session will last from 12 noon until 12 midnight EST.

If you or a loved one have been injured by negligence in operation of a large commercial truck in or from Georgia, contact us today to determine whether you have a claim.
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As a trucking safety trial attorney in Georgia, I find that one of the most valuable sources of information about accident prevention in the trucking industry is the Truck Safety Coalition. It is a partnership between The Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways (CRASH) Foundation, and Parents Against Tired Truckers (P.A.T.T).

The Truck Safety Coalition is dedicated to reducing the number of deaths and injuries caused by truck-related crashes, providing compassionate support to truck crash survivors and families of truck crash victims, and educating the public, policy-makers and media about truck safety issues.

If you or a loved one have been injured by negligence in operation of a large commercial truck in or from Georgia, contact us today to determine whether you have a claim.
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In my Atlanta-based trucking safety litigation practice, I often see the tragic outcomes of catastrophic trucking accidents. And because of that, when I travel on the highways I am alert to the minority of truckers who ignore the safety rules. Most of the time they get by with it, without a bad outcome, but slackness about safety will inevitably lead to tragedy.

Some folks, of course, think that statistics are irrelevant to them simply because they are unique and bad things only happen to others. Many of those folks are eventually known as defendants, casualties or … statistics.

And I often wind up representing truckers who are injured by other truckers, as well as “four-wheelers” who are hit by large trucks.

The statistics about the hazards in trucking are impressive. Data collected by the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) and Motor Carrier Management Information System (MCMIS) reported the following National Crash Facts for 2008:

* 4,066 large trucks and 247 buses were involved in crashes resulting in fatalities
* There were 4,229 fatalities in crashes involving large trucks and 307 fatalities in crashes involving buses
* 129,653 large trucks and 14,045 buses were involved in non-fatal crashes
* 51,680 large trucks and 7,603 buses were involved in crashes resulting in injury
* There were 71,329 injuries in crashes involving large trucks and 17,148 injuries in crashes involving buses
* 77,973 large trucks and 6,442 buses were involved in tow-away crashes
* 2,641 large trucks and 11 buses were involved in Hazmat (HM) Placard crashes
If you or a loved one have been injured by negligence in operation of a large commercial truck in or from Georgia, contact us today to determine whether you have a claim.
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