Jim Vaughn, CUSP – Page 3 – Utility Fleet Professional

Enforcement of Vehicle Weight and Load Securement Rules

Written by Jim Vaughn, CUSP on May 18, 2018. Posted in Focus on Fleet Safety.

In the past few months, I have received comments and inquiries from all over the U.S. regarding what appears to be stepped-up enforcement of both load securement and vehicle weight. It’s not unusual that these topics garner attention from the U.S. Department of Transportation when it comes to carriers, but this recent uptick seems to be directed at smaller commercial vehicles as well as bucket trucks and digger derricks. There have not been any changes of note in the rules for vehicle weight and load securement; however, it appears that some latitude taken by utilities, if not given by the DOT, has caught the attention of those responsible for enforcement of the rules.

In the last couple of years, state enforcement agencies have used local media to inform local commercial businesses – that are not carriers – that they would be stopped if they did not appear to comply with loading and marking standards for their class of vehicles. In Arizona, New Mexico, Washington and Colorado, my colleagues and I began to hear of roadside stops involving lawn maintenance companies and small construction concerns that pulled trailers with loaders, backhoes and super lawn machines. That soon extended to power company trucks, especially those loaded with large wire reels. I even heard of one instance in which state enforcement set up scales in a shopping center parking lot on a well-known route out of a power company service center. Within 40 minutes they cited 22 vehicles for being overweight. You would think drivers would have warned others, but the DOT waved them into the parking area before they started weighing and inspecting the vehicles, so no one knew what to expect. It shouldn’t have been – but it was – a big surprise for that utility’s fleet management to learn what kinds of loads lineworkers were putting on those trailers.

That is part of the problem. Craft workers – including lineworkers, cable splicers and tree workers – are licensed as CMV Class A operators. They take the same exams and demonstrate the same skills to become licensed as any other commercial truck driver does. However, in the utility and utility contractor industry, the frequency and types of violations reported in the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s Safety and Fitness Electronic Records (SAFER) System (https://safer.fmcsa.dot.gov) show a lack of compliance among craft drivers. The top violations of the Behavior Analysis Safety Improvement Category (BASIC) among utility drivers are vehicle inspections, trailer brakes, vehicle weight, lighting and reflectors. These compliance violations are an easy problem to remedy with training and reminders. Craft workers must understand that when they settle into the seat of that Class 7 vehicle, they are DOT drivers, not craft workers.

Misunderstanding of GVWR
Fleet managers also should be aware that, as of July 2017, Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations (FMCSR) have been updated and violation codes have been added. Among them are speed and weight class violations for tires, including de-rating of speed and weight class of tires for underinflation. Overloading of tires brings us to both an existing problem and an emerging problem. The existing problem is drivers’ understanding of vehicle and trailering weights, as well as load balancing on trailers. Without being too critical of craft workers, it seems that if a load will fit on a trailer, it goes to the worksite. As a longtime safety auditor, I have found numerous instances of heavily overloaded trailers. In those cases, I found some fairly common reasons for the conditions, including a misunderstanding of gross vehicle weight ratings (GVWR).

It’s easy to do. Power units are relatively simple. They are designed to trailer by fifth wheel, and the gross combined vehicle weight rating (GCVWR) is listed right there on the door. Utility trucks often are purchased as chassis cabs with doorplates defining the GCVWR and curb weight of the chassis. Some chassis manufacturers – but not all – list the GCVWR, which is the chassis, payload for the chassis and maximum towing capacity. Once the truck is configured with booms and bodies, the curb weight changes dramatically and so does the payload capacity. Not all manufacturers of equipment replace the doorplates, so the truck arrives with the wrong information on the door. Without curb weight, the trailering capacity is unknown. If the chassis does not have the GCVWR listed, no one will know the capacity of the vehicle for trailering. Add to that the loading of storage bins, and the curb weight is not known. Since the combination weight rating is established by the braking capacity, this issue of overweight truck-trailer combinations can be a serious one on the road.

There is another issue with trailers and loading. Each truck’s GVWR is a combination of curb weight and payload. Payload also includes trailer tongue weight on the truck’s hitching system. Tongue weight is ideally suited to be 10 to 15 percent of the total and trailer load weight. If a trailer always carries the same load, such as a backhoe, the trailer can be configured for the weight and the stops on the deck can assure the load on the trailer is properly balanced for the tongue weight of 10 to 15 percent. However, if utility trailers are used, they can be loaded in any number of loads and balances, often overloading tongues. Overloading a trailer tongue can compromise steering and stopping and increase risks, especially in emergency maneuvers.

Solutions
Fleet managers should have a program for loading and rating that makes it easy for drivers to match trailers with trucks. Truck doorplates should list GVWR, GCVWR and curb weight of the straight truck with booms mounted and bins loaded. Truck bumpers should be labeled with the maximum trailer weight. Ideally, a single-point scale should be placed in the yard so that drivers can pull up and drop the trailer’s landing gear onto the trailer to see what the tongue weight is.

For trailers, GVWR rating, curb weight and load rating should be marked. Tires should be purchased to meet the weight/speed loads expected on both trucks and trailers. Finally, locate a scale to weigh trucks and axle loads, whether in the yard or off-site. Drivers and foremen should be trained, and each truck should have an information card to show axle weight limits for that specific truck.

CDL Operator Class
The FMCSR as well as most state driver’s license books have pictograms that show silhouette shapes of trucks represented in GVWR classes. With advances in suspension, engine output and rear-end ratios, trucks can haul more than ever. This can lead to some surprise roadside inspection outcomes and really mess with your BASIC scores. For instance, trucks under 10,001 pounds are GVWR Class C and are not regulated by FMCSR. In the past, Ford F-350s and Chevrolets were generally considered exempt from FMCSR. However, a quick look at the load and trailering schedules on these manufacturers’ websites show that F-350s and the GM 3500 series, with the right combinations of suspension, transmission, power plant and rear-end ratios, now can trailer 30,000 pounds. That means that in these extreme rigs, the chassis are now rated as GVWR Class 7 vehicles. If that’s the case, your F-350s must meet all of the requirements of any CMV for inspections, safety equipment, markings, driver qualifications and so on.

Load Securement
Load securement – as it pertains to miscellaneous small items laying in truck beds – is the last item we’ll discuss in this issue. Even though all vehicles under city codes can be cited for losing loads, we must look at load securement from the FMCSR perspective. Load securement has gained focus in large part due to two events that occurred in early 2018 and made national news. Materials from commercial vehicles left the beds of trucks, bounced across narrow medians and entered the windshields of cars passing in the opposite direction. On both occasions, the cars’ drivers were struck in the head; one of the drivers died and the other is permanently disabled. The items that bounced out of the truck beds were a steel wedge about 14 inches long and a 5/8-inch-by-22-inch DA bolt. The owners of the lost materials were never identified, but load securement enforcement for lighter trucks is ramping up across the nation. Enforcement is declaring that the traditional 2-inch-by-6-inch plank often fitted across the tail-end of crew trucks, bucket trucks, mechanics trucks and line trucks, as well as stair or ladder access points, is not load securement. The rule of thumb is if an item can bounce off, it is not secured. Fleet managers should look at their trucks for these small-item control issues and get ahead of the enforcement curve, not in the least to prevent injuring someone from the loss of a pole-top pin at 60 mph. The solutions are many, but we have seen larger solid barriers on sides and rear decks, as well as cargo nets and tarps fitted over pickup, crew and mechanics trucks.

About the Author: After 25 years as a transmission-distribution lineman and foreman, Jim Vaughn, CUSP, has devoted the last 20 years to safety and training. A noted author, trainer and lecturer, he is a senior consultant for the Institute for Safety in Powerline Construction. He can be reached at jim@ispconline.com.

Preventing Future Driving Incidents

Written by Jim Vaughn, CUSP on February 26, 2018. Posted in Focus on Fleet Safety.

Fleet management economics are not just about predictive scheduling, inspection and maintenance. Yes, you can predict and control operating costs by keeping and analyzing records. But one thing you can’t do is predict accidents, other than predicting you will have one at some point. However, accidents – especially expensive ones – don’t have to be an unpredictable liability. In fact, most accidents don’t have to happen at all, although sometimes we as managers enable them.

A few years ago, I got a call from the sheriff of a small town in Tennessee. I was working for a contractor at the time, and one of our trucks had been found on its side in the trees off a small two-lane road. The cab was crushed and our driver was deceased, his body trapped in the wreck for several hours. This was not just a matter of having to cut away the cab. The driver, who was not wearing a seat belt, had been thrown below the steering column in the crash. The cab folded in and around him, and the truck was a total loss.

The reason I chose this story to make the following points is due to how the incident played out within the organization. Everyone was devastated by the loss of the driver. That was expected. But after a few weeks, the incident became the focus of accounting, and that’s when the safety department came under scrutiny. That’s because the highway patrol had completed the incident investigation, and they discovered three enabling elements that – had any of them been changed – would have prevented the accident from occurring. The driver would not have died, the truck would not have been totaled and the financial loss would have been avoided.

These three elements won’t be common to all incidents, but I’ve detailed them here to demonstrate to readers that most incidents are avoidable. In addition, I’ve also identified some cultural initiatives that can prevent the enabling of future incidents.

Element 1: The Route
The truck was a Freightliner twin-axle, 20-ton digger derrick. There were three main routes from the yard to the project site. It was 7:45 a.m., and the driver voiced concerns about traffic. According to his crewmates, he knew a faster route that was rarely used and would bypass the morning traffic. So, what was the value of the time saved? The incident investigation indicated the backroad route could have saved time only if the 35-mph speed limit was exceeded by 30 mph. The other two routes – an interstate and a four-lane highway – had fewer turns, fewer stops and speed limits of 55 to 65 mph. Perhaps more important was the construction of the roadways. In addition to having fewer turns, the two higher-speed highways had shoulders that varied from 26 inches at the narrowest to 96 inches at the widest. The shoulders became the most important issue because the rural road the driver had chosen had no shoulder. In several places, the road dropped off into rocky ruts just inches off the white line. The highway patrol’s analysis of the cause of the incident was that the right front wheel of the digger derrick dropped off the road into a rut, causing the driver to lose control of the vehicle.

Element 2: Seat Belts
There was never any doubt that the truck driver lost control of the vehicle. A FedEx driver following the truck prior to the crash said the truck lurched to the right and continued to pull farther down the slope until it careened left back toward the highway. The crash analysis indicated the truck’s path clearly followed the FedEx driver’s description. When the truck re-entered the highway, it entered at an angle almost 15 degrees out of line. The re-entry was so hard and fast that the truck went airborne for 22 feet, and then bounced and careened onto its side before plowing into the trees. Evidence from the crash analysis also indicated that the driver never touched the brakes and that, once the turn back toward the road was made, no effective driver control was maintained. Because the driver was not wearing a seat belt, the movement of the cab dislodged him from behind the seat at some point after the vehicle had left the road.

Element 3: Driver Fitness
The autopsy of the driver indicated he likely was impaired by drug use at the time of the incident. The yard where the driver worked from was a small operation in a small town. Everyone knew each other, and in fact, three of the office employees, including the local manager’s secretary, were related to the driver who died in the crash. That may have played a role in the employer’s failure to remove the driver from safety-sensitive functions when it was discovered that he had become addicted to opiates following a back injury the year before. The manager of the operation learned that the driver was abusing opiates when police had come to serve warrants a month earlier. A local pharmacist had discovered that the driver was seeing several doctors and getting hydrocodone prescriptions from each of them. Had the manager reported the discovery to the employer’s DOT manager, the driver would have been removed from safety-sensitive duties and would not have driven on the job again until he had received the help he needed for his condition. It is certain that, had the proper action been taken, he would not have been driving that day.

Driver Safety Training
This sad story becomes even more unfortunate when we realize that simple pre-emptive steps could have prevented it. How many drivers do you have who don’t use seat belts? How many of them know that if you can’t stay behind the wheel, you can’t maintain control of the vehicle? How many of them realize how violent a ride becomes when a truck gets out of control? There is no reason for any employer not to have control of seat-belt use by drivers, but it is one of the top driver-safety deficiencies found in third-party safety audits of utility drivers.

Drivers and DOT compliance officers know the rules, but do your managers? Managers, supervisors and foremen should be given annual refreshers on DOT policies beyond the required reasonable-suspicion training. Supervisory staff also should be aware of DOT requirements for carrier registration, driver qualification and employer/driver policies. Your supervisory staff is the front line. They are the ones who interface with the workforce and are more likely than anyone to be the first to witness risk behaviors that indicate problems.

Driver safety training is key at companies with the best driver performance. This training is not about smooth shifting, inspections or hours-of-service logs. Driver safety programs can be as rigorous as the Smith System or as simple as offerings from your insurance company. Your drivers may be professionals, but that doesn’t mean they have a natural capacity for recognition of risks that can be avoided. Good choices by drivers improve the safety aspects of operating on the road. Drivers need to operate in an environment of control and avoidance. Training to achieve that in your driver force is not difficult or expensive. In the long run, it will be far less of an expense than the next avoidable crash.

About the Author: After 25 years as a transmission-distribution lineman and foreman, Jim Vaughn, CUSP, has devoted the last 20 years to safety and training. A noted author, trainer and lecturer, he is a resident subject matter expert for the Incident Prevention Institute. He can be reached at jim@utilitybusinessmedia.com.

Author: Jim Vaughn, CUSP

Enforcement of Vehicle Weight and Load Securement Rules

Preventing Future Driving Incidents

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