Commentary:
Speed governors are the best option for reducing crashes involving big trucks
By Stephen C. Owings
More than 5,000 auto occupants and truckers will die this year in highway accidents involving tractor trailer trucks and cars. That's the same death toll as two airliner crashes a month, but in this case, the violence is on the highways—not in the airways.
This nation's indispensable, vital system of transporting essential goods from manufacturer to end-user over the highways on big trucks is critical to our economy and to our quality of life. Virtually everything we touch in the course of a day came to us on a truck, and anyone who realizes that cannot be anti-trucker. Indeed, we must take steps to strengthen the trucking industry and to ensure its long-term vitality and effectiveness. And that means, among other things, we must make the industry safer for everyone—for the professional drivers behind the wheels of the 18-wheelers and for the amateurs in the four-wheelers. (With more than 1,000 highway fatalities among truckers annually, it has been documented that long-haul truck driving is the deadliest profession in America).
There's an abundance of suggested regulations and laws, and lots of technology available that could reduce the death toll involving trucks by limiting top speeds of big rigs so they can stop sooner and maneuver better to avoid wrecks. (Sure, four-wheelers make stupid mistakes that cause crashes, but should that be a death sentence for the trucker and the passenger car driver, both of whom are going too fast?)
Of all the proposed solutions to reduce the alarming trucker/auto occupant death rate currently being discussed on the local, state and national level, the option of activating speed governors on 18-wheelers to keep them from going over 65 miles per hour would be the easiest to implement. Many truckers, regulators, policy makers and car drivers agree that requiring activation of speed governors on trucks with 10 wheels or more is a workable option that should be required. The car-truck accident rate in England has plummeted since speed governors were required on trucks there years ago.
It's the height of irony that while all modern tractor trucks roll off the assembly line with computerized speed governors already installed, not all are activated and used when the truck is on the highway. We suppose this reflects a belief by some that they can make more money by getting their loads to their final destinations faster. That's not always true. If there's a fatal wreck that's caused by speed and the inability to maneuver safely or stop in time, the economics don't matter any more, do they? A modern 18-wheeler loaded with 80,000 pounds (40 tons) of freight takes three times the distance to stop that it takes a regular passenger auto.
Many trucking firms have the speed governors activated on their fleets because they have calculated evidence showing it is not only safer, but also economically wise to do so. Slower trucks mean fewer accidents, and that translates precisely into fewer injuries and deaths for truckers and motorists, less property and equipment damage, fewer lawsuits, longer life for tires, brakes and other operating systems—not to mention significant fuel savings and less pollution. It's an upside to the soaring price of fuel that many trucking companies are slowing down to save fuel to help control one of their greatest expenses.
The 70,000-pound tractor-trailer truck that was unable to stop and crushed our son's car from behind in 2002, killing him and injuring his brother, was speeding along over 70 mph on cruise control. No one can be certain, but if there had been a speed governor activated on that truck that day, Cullum might still be here.
Please read Drive Safer for passenger car driving safety tips important to practice when you are sharing the road with large trucks.