HEADLINE: DOT to publish final rule on drug and alcohol testing
The Omnibus Transportation Employee Testing Act of 1991 requires drug and alcohol testing of safety-sensitive transportation employees in aviation, trucking, railroads, mass transit, pipelines, and other transportation industries.
The Department of Transportation today gave notice of a Final Rule for transportation workplace drug and alcohol testing programs which includes testing for the drug Ecstasy, lowering cut-off levels for cocaine and amphetamines and conducting mandatory initial testing for heroin.
The Federal Register posting will be published this coming Monday, Aug. 16, for the Final Rule, which goes into effect Oct. 1.
DOT notes that it is required by the Omnibus Transportation Employees Testing Act (Omnibus Act) to follow the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) requirements for the testing procedures and protocols.
In addition to the testing protocols for the above-mentioned drugs, DOT brought several of its testing definitions in line with those of HHS.
The Final Rule also covers qualifications and testing for medical review officers.
Each medical review officer or MRO will need to be re-qualified — including passing an examination given by an MRO training organization — every five years. The Final Rule eliminated the requirement for each MRO to take 12 hours of continuing education every three years.
An MRO will not need to be trained by an HHS-approved MRO training organization as long as the MRO meets DOT’s qualification and re-qualification training requirements.
The Final Rule does not allow the use of Health and Human Services-certified Instrumented Initial Testing Facilities (IITFs) to conduct initial drug testing because the Omnibus Act requires laboratories to be able to perform both initial and confirmation testing but IITFs cannot conduct confirmation testing.
The Omnibus Transportation Employee Testing Act of 1991 requires drug and alcohol testing of safety-sensitive transportation employees in aviation, trucking, railroads, mass transit, pipelines, and other transportation industries. DOT publishes rules on who must conduct drug and alcohol tests, how to conduct those tests, and what procedures to use when testing. These regulations cover all transportation employers, safety-sensitive transportation employees, and service agents — roughly 10 million people. Encompassed in 49 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Part 40, the Office of Drug & Alcohol Policy & Compliance (ODAPC) publishes, implements, and provides authoritative interpretations of these rules.
The document can be viewed at the Federal Register’s Public Inspection website: http://www.ofr.gov/OFRUpload/OFRData/2010-20095_PI.pdf (This link is only good for today, August 13. )
After today DOT expects to have the link on its website Monday at www.dot.gov/ost/dapc.
End.
Land Line; Tuesday, June 22, 2010
HEADLINE: After texting, DOT will target other distractions
Byline: David Tanner, associate editor
U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has already declared texting while driving to be prohibited for the operators of commercial vehicles and there is a proposed rulemaking to that effect. But while that is going on, additional rules will soon be in the pipeline to target other forms of distraction such as dispatch systems and CBs.
Rose McMurray, chief safety officer for Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration said her agency is developing new rules that target a broader range of distractions.
“Once we issue a final rule on texting, we will be developing a second rule examining the full range of other in-vehicle distractions like dispatch systems, using CB radios, etc.,” McMurray told the National Association of Small Trucking Companies on June 11 in Hendersonville, TN.
“And hopefully develop a competent and coherent proposal that reduces risk but doesn’t unnecessarily affect the legitimate needs for communication with and by the driver.”
McMurray cited research showing that a driver sending or receiving a text message does not pay attention to the road for an average of 4.6 seconds. That’s more than enough time to encounter a hazard such as slowed or stopped traffic or a maneuver that requires quick reaction time.
“It has always been a requirement that truck drivers maintain the highest safety standards when they operate their vehicles. This includes not engaging in risky behavior, which would include not texting while driving,” McMurray said. Read her prepared remarks by clicking here: ttp://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/about/news/speeches/NASTC.aspx
In March, Secretary LaHood announced a proposed rule to ban texting by CMV drivers in March, declaring that violations could lead to civil penalties and fines up to $2,750. LaHood quickly followed that up with a declaration that texting was already banned under existing rules for CMV drivers. The rules apply to texting and e-mail, including the use of laptops and phones unless the driver is using hands-free technology.
OOIDA and truckers generally support rules to prohibit texting and other distractions while driving, but they want the rules to be fair and balanced.
OOIDA filed comments asking FMCSA for clarification on the use of laptops and smart phones for navigation. Many small-business truckers use laptops or phones for navigation rather than purchasing stand-alone GPS devices. The Association is also asking for analysis and clarification on the role of fleet management systems such as Qualcomm pertaining to driver distraction.
“OOIDA is concerned that the proposed rule permits the use of ‘fleet management systems’ without any analysis of what kind of distraction they impose on drivers,” OOIDA President and CEO Jim Johnston stated in the Association’s comments.
The Association has also posed concerns about driver privacy.
End.
Overdrive online blog; Thursday, March 4, 2010
Blog HEADLINE: CSA 2010 — questions of accountability, fairness
In my “Feeling the heat” piece — part of the regulatory package of stories that’s featured in the March Overdrive – about certain Comprehensive Safety Analysis 2010 pilot test carriers’ experience with the new comprehensive enforcement system, which goes live nationwide in July, there’s a lengthy sidebar dedicated to issues of fairness and accountability. Many drivers and carriers alike are bristling at the real-time points-based system’s addition of points immediately to a carrier’s score for problems with loads, for instance, that drivers are not able to see being loaded; for accidents where there is no fault assigned on-site; or where it’s clear the big-rig driver was on the wrong end of somebody else’s unsafe party (”If I’m stopped at a stoplight and some idiot drunk with a carload of people crashes into the back of my trailer, I’m cited for four injuries in that crash,” said Dart Safety Vice President Gary Volkman).
The full text of the story can be read in our digital edition, and I’d recommend it for a look into what’s coming. Here, I thought I’d take a moment to highlight the remarks of one Steve Bugg, a company driver for Kennesaw Transportation, who had some questions of his own for FMCSA about how exactly the agency planned to allow for drivers’ records in their internal driver-rating system to be cleared of speeding tickets thrown out in court, not to mention the fact that, under CSA 2010, a simple speeding warning will count toward carriers’ scores, giving that warning, in the end, a much bigger weight than it’s ever had in the past.
Kennesaw, under the CSA 2010 pilot test program in Georgia, experienced FMCSA interventions and changed their policy toward driver speeding infractions to include warnings, for instance, as other carriers out there have done as well.
Bugg took those changes in stride, as have other drivers, seeing clearly the increased cooperation between drivers/leased owner-operators and their carriers that CSA 2010 is necessitating. However, he also echoes a commonly held point of view among drivers about the seeming “guilty until proven innocent” nature of being held accountable in carrier safety scores for roadside observations that don’t carry any due process of law with them. My video interview with him makes these points clear.
End.
TEXTING BANNED FOR CMV DRIVERS
Yesterday morning US DOT Secretary Ray LaHood and FMCSA Administrator Anne Ferro have announced a new ban on texting by commercial motor vehicle drivers,
with new “regulatory guidance” to be officially published in the Federal Register later this week.
Although current safety regulations do not include an explicit prohibition against texting while driving, FMCSA feels that an existing general restriction against the use of additional equipment and accessories that decrease safety applies to the use of electronic devices for texting. FMCSA will further explain that handheld or otherwise wireless electronic devices that are brought into a CMV are considered
additional equipment. The agency will define texting as the review of, or preparation and transmission of, typed messages though any such device or the engagement in any form of electronic data retrieval through any such device.
FMCSA will state that it knows the concerns of carriers
that have invested significant money in electronic dispatching tools and clearly says that this new guidance should not be construed to prohibit the use of such technology. Guidance will also not be construed to prohibit the use of cell phones for purposes other than text messaging.
TRUCK-INVOLVED FATALITIES DROP AGAIN
The rate of truck-involved fatalities in the United States dropped 12.3% in 2008 to a record low, the American Trucking
Assns. said last week. The figure fell to 1.86 fatalities
per 100 million miles, the lowest since records began being kept in 1975, from 2.12 per 100 million miles in 2007.
ATA calculated the figures based on vehicle miles traveled data recently released from the Federal Highway Administration and crash data previously released by the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration. The drop is the largest year-to-year drop on record and the fifth consecutive drop in the annual rate. Injuries from truck-involved crashes fell 11 % to 39.6 per 100 million miles, from 44.4 per 100 million in 2007. ATA attributes the declines to the hours-of-service regulations that took effect in 2005. The truck-involved fatality rate fell more than 20% since that year.
January 4, 2010
TO:Trucking Company Managers
FROM:The Lucas County Traffic Safety Program, the Lucas County Truck Safety Committee and the Toledo Trucking Association
RE: Safety Posters
In 2010, the members of the Lucas County Truck Safety Committee, a standing committee of the Lucas County Traffic Safety Program, will develop a series of four posters targeting commercial drivers and providing them with safety tips and information. There will be four posters designed in the year 2010.
The posters are designed with safety messages and information specifically for the commercial driver and are being emailed to members of the Toledo Trucking Association and the Ohio Trucking Association.You can print the posters in 8.5 X 11, 8.5 X 13 or 11 X 17 sizes.We are asking your company to print out the poster for display in the break room, at the time clock, or wherever drivers might congregate.They could also be used as pay check stuffers.
There is no charge to receive these posters.In 2010, the Truck Safety Committee will be sending you posters in early January, April, July, and September and once again all will be directed at commercial drivers and their safety.
If you have questions, please feel free to contact either Lonnie Hoepf or myself.Thank you in advance for your assistance in getting these safety messages out to commercial drivers.
Sincerely,
Gwen Neundorfer, CoordinatorLonnie Hoepf, Safety Director
