The Further Trouble With Trucks

If you've read Riders on the Road or been paying attention to the news, you know already that in October, federal regulations were revised to allow truck drivers to spend more time on the road without a break. They say this will make us safer out there. Do you believe that? Neither do I. I'm revisiting this topic today because I just heard a true story that needs to be shared. This story is about a truck driver, not one of the Riders, but a friend.

This driver had been on the road for several hours, and was getting sleepy. He held out for as long as he could, knowing that he barely had time to get his load to its destination on time, but finally had to call his dispatcher and ask permission to take a break because he just couldn't keep his eyes open any longer. And how do you suppose his dispatcher responded? Did he say, "Sure pal, go ahead and get a little rest; safety is our first priority."? Uh, no. He said, "I don't care how tired you are, that load needs to be in yon big city five hours from now. Don't you dare stop."

So our obedient driver kept on trucking until just a few minutes later, when he was awakened by the commotion of his rig crashing into the ditch off to the right. Thankfully, he was only injured slightly, the cargo wasn't damaged too badly, and arrived just a little late. Especially thankfully, he went off the road rather than into a car carrying a very nice family. Still, it wasn't exactly the best of all possible conclusions to our little story, was it?

Had either of them only known, it would have been easy to come to the sensible conclusion that a slightly late delivery for a nap would have been far better than a slightly late delivery for an accident, but they didn't. What did they know?

The dispatcher knew that he was in trouble if the load was late, and may have thought he knew that the driver wasn't really going to fall asleep, but was just looking for an excuse to take it easy for a while. He may have given other drivers the same instructions in the past without the same unpleasant consequences. Who knows?

The driver knew that he shouldn't be behind the wheel, but also knew he was in trouble if the load was late, and that if he disobeyed his orders he would be. He also knew that was the kind of behavior that gets you fired.

Both of them should have known that risking the driver's life and limb, never mind that of the motorists innocently driving near him, was wrong. But both of them were working in an environment where the pressure of a timely delivery was more urgent than safety concerns.

Why? That's what I want to know. There's got to be something very wrong with a system that makes that kind of decision look like a good idea. Can you folks in the trucking biz shed any light on this for us? Any suggestions? Wouldn't we all like to be a little safer out there? Yes, we would.