Tag Archives: STOP Underrides! Bill

Thoughts on Landmark Underride Legislation

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , , ,

The video below may be meaningless to you. But the November 5 vote in the U.S. House on the Infrastructure Bill represents over 8 years of hard work and dedication. It symbolizes the answer to many prayers and petitions to bring to this nation the end of Death by Underride on the nation’s highways.

The historic inclusion of #underride provisions in this legislation is a major step forward in the long “fight” to end death by underride. We are thankful for the support and prayers which have lifted us up from far too many people to list here.  But we want you to know that we thank you all very much.

It is notably significant that part of the Infrastructure Bill that was passed on 11/5/2021, as shown above, is the part not mentioned in the news concerning safety items included in the bill.

Underride Section of the Infrastructure Bill of 2021

“(4) UNDERRIDE CRASH.—The term ‘‘underride  crash’’ means a crash in which a trailer or semitrailer intrudes into the passenger compartment  of a passenger motor vehicle.”

The bill includes the following provisions:

  • A mandate for the USDOT to upgrade the 1996 federal standard for rear underride guards so that all new trailers must “be equipped with rear impact guards that are designed to prevent passenger compartment intrusion from a trailer.” (rear crash test video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VucNLZIsIU)
  • The bill also calls for: “ADDITIONAL RESEARCH.—The Secretary  shall conduct additional research on the design and development of rear impact guards that can—(A) prevent underride crashes in cases in which the passenger motor vehicle is traveling at speeds of up to 65 miles per hour; and (B) protect passengers in passenger motor vehicles against severe injury in crashes in which the passenger motor vehicle is traveling at speeds of up to 65 miles per hour.”
  • The bill requires that DOT revise the regulations relating to minimum periodic inspection standards, so that underride protection is included in commercial motor vehicle annual inspections.
  • It also requires action on side underride, that is, “SIDE UNDERRIDE GUARDS.—   IN GENERAL.—Not later than 1 year after  the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary  shall—  (A) complete additional research on side underride guards to better understand the overall effectiveness of side underride guards; . . . (D) if warranted, develop performance standards for side underride guards.” (Side guard crash test video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nh-_KNKeYz4)
  • “The Secretary shall establish an Advisory Committee on Underride Protection to provide advice and recommendations to the Secretary on safety regulations to reduce underride crashes and fatalities relating to underride crashes.”

In addition to this historic federal underride legislation, we are awaiting a response to our September 2021 Petition for a Safety Recall of trailers without side guards. The American Association for Justice (AAJ) supports our petition to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to recall semitrailers due to lack of side underride guards. We received a letter of support from AAJ on October 25, 2021:

AAJ Letter of Support – Trailer Safety Recall Petition

Of particular significance is this statement in the AAJ letter to Secretary Buttigieg:

“Van-type and box semi trailers vehicles that do not have underride guards are defective in design, under the statutory definition of defect, because they are missing the critical safety feature of the side underride guard. NHTSA is well within its authority to issue a recall on this critical design defect, that clearly poses an unreasonable risk to highway safety.“

Meanwhile, we have been assured by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Office of Defects Investigation that they are taking this petition into serious consideration and will shortly be posting our petition online. We expect that there will then be an opportunity for anyone to submit a Public Comment on this petition.

All of this has been possible because of your prayers and support. THANK YOU.

Regards,

Jerry Karth

Perry Ponder (AngelWing inventor) & Jerry Karth at the Second Underride Roundtable

“The victory is ours but the battle is the LORD’s.“

Underride Included in Senate Bipartisan Surface Reauthorization Bill Introduced Today

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , , ,

GOOD NEWS: The Senate Commerce Committee just released the text of their Infrastructure Bill today.

It has an Underride Section which is very similar to the House T&I Committee’s Bill — not the full STOP Underrides Bill because it leaves out Front Underride Protection and Single Unit Trucks and doesn’t mandate side guards, only says to do research and develop a standard, if warranted.

But it is definitely more than we’ve ever had and we’re hoping that DOT is already motivated to take action. However, if you have been following the Infrastructure Bill in the news, nobody knows how it is going to be paid for — and that could hold things up!

Here’s a link to the Bill: https://www.commerce.senate.gov/…/ACEB4B07-B232-4176…

And here’s a link to the Underride Section: https://annaleahmary.com/…/Underride-Section-of…

Here’s an article in the media: https://www.commerce.senate.gov/…/cantwell-wicker…

Here’s an article on the House version: After 19-Hour Markup, Committee Advances Two Major Pieces of Bipartisan Legislation to Modernize America’s Infrastructure, Create Jobs, and Restore U.S. Global Competitiveness

After all, it’s only been 19,076 days since DOT said they were going to add side guards!

“Chattanoga crash that killed 5 underscores bill to add protective barriers to semi trucks”

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Related post: Retrofit Solutions for Rear Impact Guards to Prevent Deadly Underride

“Chattanoga crash that killed 5 underscores bill to add protective barriers to semi trucks”

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , ,

Let’s make truck crashes more survivable!

Related post:Retrofit Solutions for Rear Impact Guards to Prevent Deadly Underride

“Her sisters died in a crash on the way to her wedding. Now she fights for safer highways.”

AnnaLeah and Mary, Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , , , , , , , ,

After seeing the latest segment of the WUSA9 Underride Investigative Series by Eric Flack, Teresa Woodard at WFAA in Dallas interviewed Rebekah Karth Chojnacki on January 22, 2020. Here’s the result of that interview:

Well said!

Rebekah with her three younger sisters, Susanna, AnnaLeah & Mary, at a Father/Daughter Dance, February 2009

WUSA9 Underride Investigative Series, January 21, 2020 segment, Truckers say they’re open to strengthening underride standards – with a catch:

AnnaLeah’s Too-True Story

AnnaLeah and Mary, Safety Advocacy, , , ,

True Stories Well Told recently published this all too true tale of AnnaLeah. . .

AnnaLeah was a particularly avid reader with a colorful imagination. She had a myriad ideas written down on random pieces of paper tucked into drawers, filling notebooks, or emailed to herself. She had, in fact, already created in her own mind numerous literary worlds peopled by characters with names and personalities. . .

Read more here: https://truestorieswelltold.com/2019/12/18/annaleahs-too-true-story/

AnnaLeah ever-creative wordsmith.

Hundreds of North Carolina State Fairgoers Sign STOP Underrides! Petition

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , ,

The fabulous Fall weather brought out thousands of people to the North Carolina State Fair on Saturday, October 26. At the Governor’s Highway Safety Association (GHSA) SAFETY TENT, we were ready for the hundreds of people who stopped at our booth. We seized the opportunity to share with them underride stories, photos, and crash test videos.

We didn’t actually keep track, but I would venture a guess that well over 90% of those who took the time to listen to us, and often ask questions, were glad to hear that there was a specific action which they could take after hearing about the horror of underride and how they and their families are vulnerable to this preventable traffic safety problem.

In fact, after they learned that Congress could take action to mandate that available engineering solutions be installed on all large trucks, 263 people were more than willing to sign a paper copy of our STOP Underrides! Petition.

One young woman got tears in her eyes as she was gazing at our poster:

We learned that some years ago, when she was 12, she and her mom crashed into the side of a trailer and were spared complete underride when a piece of the trailer floor somehow lodged into their car preventing it from going any further. She had no idea that underride happens to others and found it a relief to be able to sign the petition.

She wrote in a comment on her petition: The most important piece of legislation!

North Carolina U.S. legislators would do well to pay heed to this clear call from their constituents:

We Want You To STOP Underrides!

Government Accountability Office (GAO) Truck Underride Report Published After a Year-Long Investigation

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After the STOP Underrides Bill was first introduced on December 12, 2017, several members of Congress –Senators Thune, Rubio, Burr, and Gillibrand — requested that the Government Accountability Office prepare a report on truck underride guards. That report was published today and can be found here.

The online report is organized into sections, including Fast Facts, Highlights, and Recommendations. The GAO Recommendations are:

  1. Recommendation: The Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration should recommend to the expert panel of the Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria to update the Criteria to provide a standardized definition of underride crashes and to include underride as a recommended data field.
  2. Recommendation: The Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration should provide information to state and local police departments on how to identify and record underride crashes.
  3. Recommendation: The Administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration should revise Appendix G of the agency’s regulations to require that rear guards are inspected during commercial vehicle annual inspections.
  4. Recommendation: The Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration should conduct additional research on side underride guards to better understand the overall effectiveness and cost associated with these guards and, if warranted, develop standards for their implementation.

Here is a 46-page pdf of the Full Report.

I’m curious what Members of Congress along with the Department of Transportation and the trucking industry were anticipating to come out of the report. What did they expect to be uncovered that we have not already been talking and writing about and demonstrating for all to see at the D.C. Underride Crash Test on March 26, 2019 — not to mention, more importantly, with the lost lives of countless underride victims?

In a nutshell, the GAO team told the National Highway Safety Administration (NHTSA) that  Improved Data Collection, Inspections, and Research were needed. In fact, we already knew that, in order to get an accurate count of underride deaths (and injuries), better collection was needed. We have been talking about the need for rear underride guards to be added to the Vehicle Inspection Checklist.  And the STOP Underrides Bill calls for research to find the outer limits of underride protection.

But what the STOP Underrides Bill does not do is say to wait until better data collection has been collected before issuing a mandate to install proven underride protection. That would be like saying: Wait for 14 more years of underride deaths until you have improved collection of how many people are dying and then start using equipment (that was already available) so you know how many people you could have kept alive!

The GAO Report recommends that NHTSA take steps to add underride to the Model Minimum Uniform Crash Criteria (MMUCC) — a guideline to states to use for their crash report forms. However, the next version will not be issued until 2022.

If NHTSA uses this recommendation to justify holding off on underride rulemaking, then they will set us all up for a continuation of same old, same old. NHTSA might sooner or later (in 2022 when the updated MMUCC comes out) START urging states to improve their underride data collection. But then how many years of improved data will they insist that they need before they can proceed with rulemaking (which itself takes 3 or more years before it gets to the implementation phase)?
 
This is what I foresee, if NHTSA is left to their own devices (unless something else intervenes):
2022     New MMUCC
2024     States are ready for better underride data collection
2028     FARS underride data has maybe improved
2029     NHTSA issues an ANPRM to test the waters
2030     NHTSA issues a NPRM side underride rulemaking (what about the rest?)
2033     Implementation of side guard rule begins for new trucks

2043    The whole fleet will have them on (maybe).

Conservative estimate of 300 underride deaths/year x 14 years (2033) = 4,200 more needless deaths (plus catastrophic injuries) if Congress does not mandate that the Department of Transportation move forward with comprehensive underride rulemaking immediately.

What GAO recommends to NHTSA are good actions, but they fall short of an acknowledgement that people have, are, and will continue to die from truck underride unless we act decisively as a nation to mandate that the industry install equipment to prevent it.

The GAO report acknowledges that the trucking industry is waiting for a mandate before it will act. The report also illustrates how NHTSA has been less than diligent to address the underride problem. So, why would we expect that a mere recommendation to NHTSA (when they have received multiple underride safety recommendations from NTSB and multiple petitions from IIHS and others over the years) would cause them to act in a timely and effective manner to fulfill their safety mission and protect the people of this country from deadly underride?

The fourth GAO recommendation is this: The Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration should conduct additional research on side underride guards to better understand the overall effectiveness and cost associated with these guards and, if warranted, develop standards for their implementation.

What more would NHTSA need to know — than what they already know, along with what would come about through the process of issuing a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, and what they would learn through working with knowledgeable members of the Committee On Underride Protection (or COUP, as mandated in the STOP Underrides Bill), who could help them identify and understand the effectiveness and costs of underride protection?

It seems clear to me that even the under-reported 219 underride deaths, on average each year documented by NHTSA in the FARS data, do indeed warrant the development of standards for implementation of comprehensive underride protection. The side guard crash testing by IIHS and others have proven that this technology is effective at preventing underride. Therefore, I would interpret the fourth GAO recommendation as supporting the need for Congress to mandate that DOT proceed with the rulemaking outlined in the STOP Underrides! Bill. DOT has demonstrated that they have no intention of issuing rulemaking without a mandate which would force them to do so.

In my mind, the GAO Truck Underride Guards Report only confirms and strengthens my opinion that it is high time for Congress to pass the STOP Underrides Bill and get NHTSA and FMCSA started on a rulemaking process for comprehensive underride protection, which we petitioned them to do on May 5, 2014.  After years of inaction on that petition, on April 4, 2018, we submitted another petition (for supplemental comprehensive underride rulemaking) to Secretary Chao — still with no tangible action taken.

Congress, the ball is in your court.

If you want to go beyond a cursory understanding of the GAO Truck Underride Report, please read this lengthy analysis of the GAO Underride Report: Karth Cliff Notes on the GAO Truck Underride Report.

Another Tesla Side Underride Tragedy Points to Need for Truck Side Guard Mandate

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Late yesterday afternoon, I heard the news that another man has lost his life when his Tesla went under the side of a tractor trailer in Florida. No matter how it actually came about, doesn’t it seem tragic that we didn’t learn our lesson from Joshua Brown’s tragic death going under the side of a tractor trailer in a Tesla in May 2016?

Earlier today, a Tesla Model 3 owner died in a tragic accident with a semi truck. The Model 3 went under the truck’s trailer resulting “in the roof being sheared off as it passed underneath,” which is known as a “side underride” accident. Tesla Model 3 driver again dies in crash with trailer, Autopilot not yet ruled out

NTSB is sending a team to investigate this crash

Earlier this week, I wrote about the disturbing documentation that current Automatic Emergency Braking (AEB) technology on passenger vehicles is not reliably detecting large trucks: “AEB that reliably detects trucks could prevent underride crashes.” Meanwhile, what should we do? Yet, many of the voices opposing the STOP Underrides! Bill point to Collision Avoidance technology as the better route to prevent underride crashes.

Clearly, collision avoidance technology is not ready to prevent truck underride tragedies at this point in time. In contrast, comprehensive underride protection technology is ready to go — awaiting a mandate to get the ball rolling to save lives.

Here are two practical, viable solutions offered by engineers to prevent the gruesome, deadly passenger compartment intrusion (PCI) which occurs with side underride:

Download this video file to view a recent crash test by Aaron Kiefer into the side of a trailer equipped with the latest version of his SafetySkirt: Video Feb 24, 2 24 45 PM

AngelWing side guard successfully tested at the IIHS at 35 and 40 mph in 2017:

We cannot wait for the trucking industry to handle it themselves and the automotive industry is not prepared to prevent collision with large vehicles. Congress should feel proud to be the ones to make sure that this happens. Unless they want people to die!

STOP Underrides! Petition

D. C. Underride Crash Test, March 26, 2019

From the May 2016, Joshua Brown Tesla side underride crash: Witnesses reveal new details behind deadly Tesla accident in Florida

The police report indicated that Brown’s Model S collided with a tractor trailer that was perpendicular to it and continued to travel underneath it after having its windshield and roof sheared off. Because the vehicle was in Autopilot at the time, the vehicle continued to travel before veering off the road, careening through two fences, and finally coming to a rest after striking a utility pole approximately 100 feet south of the road.

Tesla released a statement on their blog:

“What we know is that the vehicle was on a divided highway with Autopilot engaged when a tractor trailer drove across the highway perpendicular to the Model S. Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied. The high ride height of the trailer combined with its positioning across the road and the extremely rare circumstances of the impact caused the Model S to pass under the trailer, with the bottom of the trailer impacting the windshield of the Model S.”

By the way, these are not “extremely rare circumstances.” Hundreds of vehicles collide with the sides of large trucks every year. Furthermore, both of these crashes clearly involved side underride. Why is this not being acknowledged and addressed?

What Truckers Should Know About Underride Protection

Truck Safety, ,

There are some things which truckers need to know about underride.