Profile:
damnim

This is damnim's Profile page. Use it to view damnim's comments, other users' replies to these comments, and comments damnim has endorsed.

What's Happening Now

April 24, 2011 12:48 pm

It is well known that truck crashes are the lowest now then they ever have been since record keeping began “WITHOUT” the use of EOBR’s. It is also well known that about 70% of truck crashes were caused by a 4 wheeler. It is also well known that the data regarding “fatigue” as a cause of truck crashes was and still is being manipulated to justify more regulations and EOBR’s. Seems to me instead of burdening the trucker with more cost and regulations you should be utilizing my tax dollars to educate the public how to drive around us. Fatigue as a justification, this is ludicrous!!! I think alot of truckers will agree the EOBR’s are nothing more then a truckers “Ankle Bracelet” we will be forced to pay for.

April 24, 2011 1:00 pm

“Actually, the FMCSA is deliberately not requiring EOBRs to record things like vehicle speed.”

Mr. Moderator this statement is factually incorrect. If the EOBR records location “City, State” it only requires a little math to figure out how fast the vehicle was traveling between two points. To flesh this out, if the EOBR records the vehicle moving from point A and records a time then records point B when the vehicle stops and records a time then the average speed of the vehicle can be determined. DOT inspectors use this formula to determine if your average speed goes over the speed limit by utilizing the entries recorded in the log books.

April 24, 2011 1:46 pm

I own and operate my own truck. The FMCSA now mandates that companies with a “HIGH” safety risk are required to install EOBR’s. Now the FMCSA utilizing manipulated data wants to force EOBR’s on all interstate truckers. Am I to presume then we are all guilty of being unsafe law breaking drivers now? If I don’t want an EOBR in “MY” legally owned truck, that should be my choice, not the governments. I drive safely and responsibly and I don’t need the government to force me to install a spendy piece of equipment to make sure that I do. I also don’t need the “fatigue” that will be created when the data from an EOBR is used to “micromanage” my time.

April 26, 2011 9:21 pm

Hi damnin. Why do you believe that the EOBR data will micromanage your time and create more fatigue?

February 10, 2011 12:48 pm

I think if we are forced to go to EOBR’s that the whole HOS should be looked at so that drivers will have more flexibility in their daily work. there are too many variables in trucking and by forcing drivers to adhere to the rules , there will be a reduction in productivity and would have a negative affect on a fragile economy

February 11, 2011 10:30 am

I do not believe EOBR’s are any more necessary for CMV than they would be for cars. I have not seen any evidence that trucks cause any more accidents than cars. If we are serious about safety EOBR’s should be mandatory on all vehicles. As far as productivity is concerned, a lot of products in america are moved with little notice and require trucks at a moments notice as opposed to freight that ships on a continual basis. I think this is what sets America apart from other countries because we can ship anything, anywhere very quickly. many times to move this type of freight quickly you can’t comply with the current HOS but that doesn’t mean you are endangering other people on the road. EOBR’s will have no affect on a large part of the industry but have a huge affect on a smaller part of the industry. FMCSA will have to weigh the cost/benefit.

February 24, 2011 11:10 pm

NO EOBRS

March 5, 2011 3:25 pm

Will law enforcement have the right to look at the eobr ? What kind of a question is that ? Except now you will have to let them in your truck so they can do that MN. style profiling when they see your home furnishings. I know that DOT law enforcement does not get enough sleep at home ether T.V’s in their bedrooms and laptops and a partner to keep them a wake doing grown up things. The EOBR’S are nothing more then a tool for law enforcement to use to come into my home away from home.

rdb
March 23, 2011 8:39 am

The electronic systems in modern trucks are delicate and expensive. The DOT regulation does not specify who is liable to damages to a trucks electronic system if a law enforcement officer causes damages to a system by not properly grounding or improperly accessing the data. This not with NAFTA precedent. A truck driver in Canada asked a law enforcement officer to sign a letter assuming damage liability prior to accessing his his limiter. The law enforcement officer refused and issued the truck driver a citation for non compliance. In court, the judge found the driver not guilty. Recommendation: Liability for damage by by law enforce needs to be clearly stated by DOT.

April 20, 2011 12:33 am

Fact!!! an eobr can and will be used to force a driver to drive when he or she is not rested.. using a qualcomm system i have in the past been awakened at night only to have my dispacher tell me my 10 hours is up and i need to get going. he has no idea how long i had been asleep or resting just that i had been sitting for 10 hours and woke me up at 2;30 am sayin i had to go ive sat my 10 hours.. now how will an eobr make this better.. as an owner operator using no qualcomm and paper logs i slept as long as i wanted and they didnt know the difference..

April 20, 2011 9:52 pm

Very true! I had my dispatcher at Melton Truck Lines in Tulsa Oklahoma both send me a QualComm and Call me on the phone in the middle of my 10 hour break and wake me up to ask me how long before my break was over. I told here 10 hours from right now, because you just interupted my 10 hour dot break. Then I hung up on her, turned off my phone and unplugged the QualComm! I quit that Sorry job 2 weeks later. They don’t want drivers, they want robots!

February 28, 2011 9:12 pm

“The principal use of EOBR Electronic on-Board Recorder data is to confirm HOS Hours-of-service (HOS) compliance, whether at roadside checks or on-site carrier reviews.”

FMCSA, DOT, NHTSA, NTSB, have all made claims that EOBR’s will make the highways safer… I ask again how?

Just by adding the mechanical device, even though the driver still has to manually add any change of duty status?

This EOBR just sounds like an overly expensive record keeper – like a paper log is.

What about this information? ATA announced that in an effort to rationalize a change in federal Hours of Service (HOS) requirements for professional truck drivers, the U.S. DOT’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) misapplied its own crash numbers so as to elevate driver fatigue… more »

…as a cause of truck crashes.

Adding an EOBR will do nothing but add yet another cost to the trucker or trucking company.. « less

April 20, 2011 12:24 am

i dont know how to comment on anothere post. but to who commented on one of mine. what I meant by drivers will have to shut down in the middle of no where often due to an eobr is not because the eobr will shut his truck off i meant because he/she will have to stop when the eobr says times up rather then making it just a few more miles to a safe place, etc. I had this happen running elogs in bad weather i had to shut down 16 miles from home because my time was up.. i had to park in reed point montana i only live 16 miles from there, but due to weather conditions and the elog i could not drive home.

March 2, 2011 5:18 pm

This is merely another phase of Big Brother. For all we know, they could have listening devices installed within.

One thing about it: If the door is opened even merely enough for someone to get their foot inside, they always tend to take more and more.

That is exactly how this government has grown so out of control.

Now they are financing their purses with more money which could have been better spent in maintenance of our vehicles or the payment of taxes we already owe.

If you just think about it: why did they just go through hiring so many new law enforcement officers?

Law Enforcement needs to focus more on those who PURSUE making money illegally, and let a person earn a fair income honorably.

March 14, 2011 12:26 am

i believe eobr’s would be a disaster for the small business trucker.case in point,i had an 18:00 appt., my 14 hrs were up at 21:30,i thought that would be plenty of time to unload,at 01:30 they were done and told me i could not stay on the property,the nearest safe haven was 1hr. away. i would like to know how i would put that into an eobr?
thank you for listening,alcanman

March 1, 2011 9:13 pm

Driver fatigue is not a real problem according to an FMCSA webinar, that was publicly was communicated on September 30, 2010, hosted by the FMCSA titled: 2009 – Historic Truck Crash Declines. The number is 1.4% fatigue related accidents in trucking.

No, I do not believe the EOBR will be effective of reducing truck crashes – mainly because it will be on the wrong vehicles.

My primary concern is FMCSA falsifying its own information to make it seem that new regulations and such are needed. Plus, adding yet another COST to the trucking company or owner operator – without a firm reasoning.

April 24, 2011 12:48 pm

It is well known that truck crashes are the lowest now then they ever have been since record keeping began “WITHOUT” the use of EOBR’s. It is also well known that about 70% of truck crashes were caused by a 4 wheeler. It is also well known that the data regarding “fatigue” as a cause of truck crashes was and still is being manipulated to justify more regulations and EOBR’s. Seems to me instead of burdening the trucker with more cost and regulations you should be utilizing my tax dollars to educate the public how to drive around us. Fatigue as a justification, this is ludicrous!!! I think alot of truckers will agree the EOBR’s are nothing more then a truckers “Ankle Bracelet” we will be forced to pay for.

April 24, 2011 1:46 pm

I own and operate my own truck. The FMCSA now mandates that companies with a “HIGH” safety risk are required to install EOBR’s. Now the FMCSA utilizing manipulated data wants to force EOBR’s on all interstate truckers. Am I to presume then we are all guilty of being unsafe law breaking drivers now? If I don’t want an EOBR in “MY” legally owned truck, that should be my choice, not the governments. I drive safely and responsibly and I don’t need the government to force me to install a spendy piece of equipment to make sure that I do. I also don’t need the “fatigue” that will be created when the data from an EOBR is used to “micromanage” my time.

rdb
March 23, 2011 11:00 am

The availability of the information that will be mandated in the proposed EOBR rule is a treasure trove of information for criminal exploitation. Even though the information required does not go to the GPS grid coordinate level, all a criminal needs to know is the city where a truck got loaded. Shipping locations are well known within the transportation community. If you tell me the city a shipment came from I can tell you the most likely contents of the load. Truck hijackers will focus on trucks that have visited cities that ship pharmaceuticals, electronics, copper, aluminum, and other high value loads. Wireless networks and/or have an external access point are generally not considered secure methods of data transmission.

To protect sensitive information the Federal Information Security… more »

…Management Act of 2002 (“FISMA”, 44 U.S.C. § 3541, et seq.) is a United States federal law enacted in 2002 as Title III of the E-Government Act of 2002 (Pub.L. 107-347, 116 Stat. 2899). The act recognized the importance of information security to the economic and national security interests of the United States.[1] The act requires each federal agency to develop, document, and implement an agency-wide program to provide information security for the information and information systems that support the operations and assets of the agency, including those provided or managed by another agency, contractor, or other source.[1]

According to FISMA, the term information security means protecting information and information systems from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, or destruction in order to provide integrity, confidentiality and availability.

As a private company, Qualcomm does not have to comply with FISMA when selling systems to private companies. When the Federal Government mandates the use of a system by Government to interact with private carriers, it now becomes subject to FISMA.

Recommendation:

A. Prior to publication of any EOBR regulation, the US DOT must comply and document compliance with all aspects of the FISMA act to achieve system accreditation as discussed in the following paragraph:

“Once the system documentation and risk assessment has been completed, the system’s controls must be reviewed and certified to be functioning appropriately. Based on the results of the review, the information system is accredited. The certification and accreditation process is defined in NIST SP 800-37 “Guide for the Security Certification and Accreditation of Federal Information Systems”.[12]”

B. Compliance with Federal Laws by DOT is not optional it is mandatory. Additionally, the reason for information security is to protect individual truck drivers from the violence associated with criminal activity associated with the exploitation of vulnerable information by criminals.
C. Once the EOBR has been certified, accredited, and documented as required by “Guide for the Security Certification and Accreditation of Federal Information Systems”, the DOT will need to republish the proposed EOBR regulation to include all the additional costs associated with information security.
« less