Trucking accident attorneys always look for (at the very minimum) the following causes for trucking accidents:

• Aggressive driving
• Excessive speed
• Driver fatigue
• Unsafe trucks or equipment
• Truck driver drug or alcohol abuse

Today I am just going to talk about truck driver fatigue and how new technology will hopefully deter this easily preventable but frequently occurring cause of trucking accidents.

Federal regulations generally require truck drivers not drive more than 11 consecutive hours.  They then must take 10 hours “off-duty.”  Over the course of a week truck drivers normally cannot drive more than 60 hours total in 7 consecutive days.  Drivers are required to keep log books recording the number of hours they drove and were off-duty.  Experienced trucking accident attorneys will investigate the logs, and ask the driver under oath about his/her rest or sleep immediately prior to the accident as well as his/her long-term sleep and driving activity.  Until recently an attorney wold for the most part have to rely on the driver telling the truth to these questions and in their log book.  Even a former administrator at NHTSA said, “Drivers keep one set of books for law enforcement and one for their pay.”  Truck drivers using only their first name also say the “cook the books” and everybody cheats on their driving hours.  The reason is truck drivers are normally paid by the mile.  So they make more money when you break it down into an hourly wage if they can drive a load straight through in 12 hours instead of having to split it out into two days.

Now you should begin to understand why trucking accident attorneys should always scrutinize the log books.  One way to do this is to verify driving and rest hours by getting the fuel receipts and shipping paperwork to try and recreate a driver’s time line using arrival times and fuel consumption.  But even this is not an exact science.

But now there is an exact science in the form of onboard electronic driver logs.  This technology does away with the old paper log books and puts touch screen computer in the truck cockpit.  The device is hooked up to the truck’s GPS device and matches the driving hours the driver is punching in with his/her truck’s location and operation.  This makes it virtually impossible for truck driver’s to lie about their driving and resting hours.  Not surprisingly, the trucking industry is fighting against having these systems installed.  Three of the four largest trucking companies currently do not use them.