NHTSA Releases Motor Coach Safety Plan
Reprinted from The Safety Record, Volume 6, Issue 6, December 2009
WASHINGTON, D.C. – After decades of successfully maintaining the status quo, motor coach manufacturers and operators are about to be regulated as part of a concerted approach to improve motorcoach safety.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has released its Motorcoach Safety Action Plan, which includes rulemaking to make these buses safer and to better qualify their drivers initiated by NHTSA and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.
Agency data show that over the past decade, crashes have killed an average of 19 motorcoach occupant fatalities each year, in addition to pedestrians, drivers, and passengers of other vehicles involved in these crashes. Driver fatigue, vehicle rollover, occupant ejection, and operator maintenance have been major factors in these fatalities and injuries.
According to the plan, the National Transportation Safety Board “identified driver-related problems as root causes responsible for 56 percent of the motorcoach crashes it investigated.” In 13 percent of the cases, the NTSB identified the condition of the vehicle as a root cause. A second study by the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute cited driver error is a factor in 31 percent of all motorcoach crashes. FMCSA’s Bus Crash Causation Study found that the bus was the critical cause of the crash in about one-half of the cases, with driver error a “primary factor nearly 80 percent of the time.”
The plan emanates from an April 30 directive from U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood to develop an integrated approach to motorcoach safety. DOT then identified seven actions that would have the greatest impact on improving motorcoach safety. Among the regulatory responsibilities for the FMCSA are rulemakings to require electronic on-board recording devices on all motorcoaches to monitor drivers’ hours and fatigue; and to propose prohibiting texting and limiting the use of cellular telephones and other devices by motorcoach drivers.
NHTSA would be required to initiate rulemaking to require the installation of seat belts on motorcoaches; to improve tire performance; and to establish performance requirements for roof crush and for ESC on motorcoaches.
LaHood also charged NHTSA with expanding its research on crash-avoidance warning systems, improved glazing and window retention techniques and fire safety. The agency is also expected to develop enhanced emergency egress requirements, with special attention to children, older people, and people with disabilities. These ambitious goals are on a fast track. According to the plan, much of this is to be accomplished in the next two years.