Washington Injury Law Blog

I came across another great post by Ken Shigley of the Atlanta Injury Law Blog  about electronic logs for semi-truck drivers. Interstate trucking companies and their drivers are required to keep paper logs that record the numbers of hours driven per day (11 hours is the maximum),  activities, and locations of stops. The abuse of these paper logs is so bad that they are often referred to as “comic books.” Many semi-truck accidents result from the abusive practices that commonly occur in paper logs.

Trucking companies put huge pressure on drivers to make delivery schedules that are impossible to do legally. Mr. Shigley had a truck driver during a deposition admit that he had destroyed log pages and replaced the pages with fakes showing less hours of driving. The driver had been driving 20 of the last 24 hours before the truck accident that killed a child of the family represented Mr. Shigley. 

Electronic driver logs have been development but are not required. The electronic log devices make it nearly impossible to change or alter the hours of driving or other activities. As you might imagine, the trucking industry doesn’t mind keeping their dirty little secret in place. Allowing their drivers to ignore the trucking laws results in profits for them. The trucking industry is unlikely to voluntarily adopt the usage of electronic driver logs.

We need to tell our legislators that allowing devastating injuries and deaths caused by big rig truck drivers who are over fatigued is unacceptable and must stop. Laws need to be passed requiring tamper proof electronic driver logs in all semi-trucks that drive on our roads and highways.