May 15, 2008

Should American Trucks Roll Slower?

You’ve undoubtedly seen the news coverage about the grounding of whole fleets of airliners because of maintenance questions, and this reflects a national attitude of zero tolerance for airline-crash deaths. Now Stephen C. Owings, founder of Road Safe America, opines that the U.S. should adopt that same attitude for highway deaths as well.

“More than 42,000 highway deaths a year are equivalent to the number of people who would die if there were some 200 airliner crashes a year, and yet, the national outcry for a solution that would result if planes were going down is absent on the highway-death issue,” said Owings. “Is one form of violent death more acceptable than another? This is a national embarrassment.”

While numerous solutions are being discussed to lower the overall highway death toll, Road Safe America has embarked on a campaign for a national regulation requiring speed governors to be set at 68 mph on tractor trailer rigs, an initiative that, it says, would lower the toll of some 4,000 automobile drivers and 1,000 truck drivers killed each year in wrecks involving the heaviest (over 26,000 pounds) trucks.

Road Safe America was founded by Steve and Susan Owings after their son, Cullum, was killed in 2002 when his car -- stopped in an interstate traffic jam – was crushed from behind by a speeding tractor trailer truck on cruise control. The organization has a petition pending before the U.S. Department of Transportation to have speed-governor activation required on all Class 7 and 8 trucks (over 13 tons in weight) at 68 mph or slower. The nonprofit is being supported in the initiative by all national safety advocacy organizations, the American Trucking Associations and numerous citizens and business executives. Speed-limiting governors are required to be set well below 68 mph on heavy trucks in the European Union, Japan, Australia and parts of Canada. Speed-limiting devices have been standard equipment on tractor trucks in the U.S. since the 1990s, and many companies and independent truckers use them, but there is no national requirement for all trucks to activate their speed governors.