Most Wanted
Transportation Safety
Improvements
Federal Issues
Highway
Improve the Safety of Motor Carrier Operations
Objective
The two most important factors in safe motor carrier operations are the operational status of the vehicles (trucks) and the performance of the individuals who drive them. If significant problems exist with trucks and/or the qualifications or fitness for duty of the drivers, the carrier should be rated by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) as unsatisfactory, forcing corrections of the problems identified within a specified time period, along with greater FMCSA oversight because problems in either of these areas could result in severe consequences for safety. If problems in these two areas persist, the motor carrier should have its license to operate revoked. The Safety Board has called on the FMCSA to implement such a system.
Summary of Action
The Motor Carrier Safety Act of 1984 directed the U.S. Secretary of Transportation to establish a procedure to determine how safely motor carriers operate. Currently, the U.S. Department of Transportation, through the FMCSA, uses a system for determining how safely a motor carrier operates that does not place sufficient emphasis on driver or vehicle qualifications.
Under the current compliance review system, when any motor carrier receives an unsatisfactory rating in two of six factors (general, driver, operational, vehicle, hazardous materials, or accident), the carrier receives a proposed unsatisfactory rating, which becomes effective according to the following timeframes: a passenger or hazardous-materials carrier has 45 days to correct the noncompliance; freight carriers have 60 days. If the carrier corrects the noncompliance to the satisfaction of the FMCSA, the rating is revised to either satisfactory or conditional. If the carrier does not correct the noncompliance within the established timeframe, the carrier receives an out-of-service order and is prohibited from operation.
The Safety Board believes that if the carrier receives an adverse rating (conditional or unsatisfactory) for either the vehicle or driver factor, regardless of ratings received in any of the other factors, the overall compliance rating should be unsatisfactory.
The FMCSA believes that its Comprehensive Safety Analysis 2010 Initiative (CSA 2010) will address this issue through the development of new performance-based systems for determining motor carrier and driver safety that emphasize preventive measures, motor carrier education, and early detection of unsafe driver and carrier conditions by decoupling the safety fitness rating from the compliance review. As the FMCSA demonstrated to stakeholders at a December 2007 public listening session and to Safety Board staff at a February 2008 meeting, all safety violations found during roadside inspections (1) will be assigned a weight based on their relationship to evidence-based crash causation patterns and (2) will be placed in seven specific categories that represent unsafe behavior on the part of carriers or drivers. These seven Behavioral Analysis Safety Improvement Categories (BASICS) include unsafe driving, fatigued driving, driver fitness, drugs and alcohol, vehicle maintenance, cargo securement, and crash experience. In February 2008, the FMCSA launched a field test of the CSA 2010 operational model in four States: Colorado, Georgia, Missouri, and New Jersey. Preliminary results indicate that 43 percent of the test carriers have logged onto the Comprehensive Safety Information System website to view their violations data, as suggested in a warning letter, and have replied to the FMCSA describing the corrective actions they have taken or are initiating in response to the warning.
On March 5, 2007, the FMCSA Administrator appointed experts from the motor carrier industry, safety advocates, and safety enforcement officials to serve on the Motor Carrier Safety Advisory Committee (MCSAC). The MCSAC, which holds regular quarterly public meetings, provides advice and recommendations to the Administrator regarding motor carrier safety programs and motor carrier safety regulations. On August 6, 2008, after considering the potential safety benefits and operational feasibility of the task, the MCSAC recommended that Safety Recommendation H-99-6 be incorporated into CSA 2010. Based on the MCSAC’s recommendation, the preliminary safety fitness methodology that is currently being tested, and the progress that has been made with the CSA 2010 initiative, the FMCSA is preparing a notice of proposed rulemaking to address safety fitness determination under CSA 2010 that is currently expected to be published in February 2009.
Although the Safety Board continues to be concerned by the slow progress made towards addressing this area since this recommendation was issued 9 years ago, the FMCSA has made potentially viable plans to address this recommendation under CSA 2010. The agency has assured the Board that it is on schedule to begin implementing the program in 2010 and has announced the ninth public listening session for October 16, 2008, at which stakeholders will be updated on the details of the field test and will be given another opportunity to provide feedback to the FMCSA on the proposed operational model. The Board will continue to monitor the FMCSA’s actions to recognize the importance of driver and vehicle factors in addressing motor carrier safety as the CSA 2010 field test continues and rulemaking is developed.
Action Remaining
Continue efforts to develop standards that appropriately recognize the importance of vehicle and driver factors in measuring the overall safety of a motor carrier’s operations.
Safety Recommendation
H-99-6 (FMCSA)
Issued February 26, 1999
Added to the Most Wanted List: 2000
Status: Open—Acceptable Response
Change the safety fitness rating methodology so that adverse vehicle and driver performance-based data alone are sufficient to result in an overall unsatisfactory rating for the carrier. (Source: Selective Motorcoach Issues. [NTSB/SIR-99/01])
October 2008
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