On Board Recorders Ordered to Prevent Dangerous Fatigued Drivers
Fatigued drivers of large trucks and buses are an ever-present danger on the roadways. Driving hours are regulated by federal hours-of-service rules, which are designed to prevent commercial vehicle-related crashes and fatalities by prescribing on-duty and rest periods for drivers.
Despite these federal regulations, our lawyers constantly discover hours- of- service violations and falsified log books attempting to hide these violations.
Last month, the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) ordered JBS Carriers, Inc. of Greeley, Colorado to install electronic on-board recorders (EOBRs) on its entire fleet of over 700 commercial trucks by March 2011 or pay $81,780 in civil fines.
Electronic on-board recorders are devices attached to commercial vehicles that automatically record the number of hours drivers spend operating the vehicle.
The order comes in response to a comprehensive investigation by FMCSA's Western Service Center that found the company in serious violation of federal hours-of-service (HOS) rules and commercial driver's license (CDL) requirements.
In the final settlement agreement issued by FMCSA, the agency cited JBS Carriers for 102 counts of falsifying drivers' hours-of-service records and three counts of allowing drivers with a suspended, revoked or canceled commercial driver's license to operate a motor vehicle.
JBS Carriers must also train current and future drivers on the proper use of EOBRs and develop a safety management system that incorporates EOBR data into drivers' hours-of-service oversight.
