CVSA announces 3-day truck safety inspection spree

Truck drivers in South Carolina can expect to spend some extra time with safety inspectors during the 2018 International Roadcheck organized by the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance. For three days in June, inspectors will pull aside thousands of commercial trucks and buses in the U.S. and Canada and evaluate vehicles and drivers for compliance.

The CVSA plans to scrutinize truck logs to check for hours-of-service violations. During the 3-day event in 2017, inspectors cited failure to comply with hours-of-service regulations as the top reason for placing drivers out of service. The U.S. Department of Transportation has also imposed an electronic logging device requirement on commercial trucks.

In addition to evaluating drivers’ adherence to rules, inspectors will put most trucks through a complete Level I inspection. Based on numbers from previous safety events, inspectors will examine an average of 15 vehicles every minute throughout North America. In 2017, these efforts resulted in approximately 15,000 trucks and buses being taken off the road because of maintenance or driver issues. Brakes represented the top mechanical reason for placing a truck out of service.

Although regulations are in place to promote highway safety, violations of safety rules routinely cause semi truck accidents. A person injured in crash caused by truck driver fatigue, poor truck maintenance or reckless driving could have a legal right to pursue damages for personal injury. Representation from an attorney could help someone burdened by injury or disability navigate the process of communicating with an insurance company or filing a lawsuit. An attorney could organize evidence about the crash to illustrate negligence. When necessary, an attorney might enlist an accident reconstruction specialist to gain testimony about the cause of the wreck.