The Truck Stops Here

Jesse Cruz, a trucker headed north on the Antelope Valley Freeway, regarded the right shoulder with dread.

There was a CHP officer waving him into the truck inspection station--which is often closed--north of the Via Princessa exit.

At 7 a.m., Cruz became the first catch of the day in a CHP campaign, backed by the Federal Highway Administration, to prevent deaths in truck accidents by cracking down on unsafe, tired or unlicensed drivers and unsafe rigs.

Cruz was ticketed for a cracked windshield, which alone would keep him from returning to the freeway. But he also had an everyday Class C license, not the Class B commercial driver’s license required. Cruz’s employers had to send another driver to get him and the truck.

He was nabbed by the “Top 10” program, supported by federal grants to the 10 states with the most fatal accidents involving commercial vehicles.

California, which leads the pack, got $100,000. That pays for a stepped-up program that targets drivers and mechanical problems.

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Fatal traffic collisions in California have been decreasing without interruption--from 4,920 in 1987 to 3,252 in 1997--even as the number of vehicles increased from 20.6 million to 21.7 million.

But trucks have not been following the trend. In 1993, there were 369 fatal truck-involved traffic accidents. That number went up to 376 in 1994 and to 386 in 1995. Then the numbers dropped to 373 in 1996 and 364 in 1997, according to CHP statistics.

Sgt. John Williams, commercial enforcement supervisor for the CHP in Los Angeles County, said the leading causes of truck-related crashes in the county are speed, tailgating and unsafe lane changes.

“Truckers from out of state enter the L.A. metropolitan area, they’re unfamiliar with the L.A. road system, they’re driving unsafely for the conditions, and they crash,” Williams said.

But according to CHP statistics, the truckers themselves are to blame less often than auto drivers they encounter. In 1997, out of 364 fatal collisions involving trucks, only 114 were determined to be the fault of the truck driver.

“A lot of crashes are caused not by the truck, but [by automobile] drivers not leaving enough space in front of them or cutting [truck] drivers off,” said CHP spokesman Steve Kohler. “Trucks cannot maneuver or stop as quickly as passenger cars can.”

Part of the federal grant funds the state’s “No-Zone” program, a series of public safety announcements aimed at educating motorists to avoid truckers’ blind spots, said Mickael Gouweloos, state program specialist for the commercial vehicle unit of the Federal Highway Administration.

“The bottom line is, it really doesn’t matter who is at fault because trucks are much bigger and heavier than cars,” he said. “The driver of the car--not the driver of the truck--is killed in fatal collisions four out of five times.”

From May through July of this year, Newhall CHP officials used the federal funding to cover overtime pay needed to put three to five officers per shift on truck enforcement, compared with just one previously, said Officer Doug Sweeney. With the beefed-up enforcement, officers handed out 442 citations to commercial drivers.

In Newhall, that crackdown followed a rash of truck-related collisions, Sweeney said. From January to July of 1997, Newhall officers recorded 330 truck-related accidents, 257 of which occurred on a five-mile downhill grade through Castaic. The 40-mph zone is known for big-rig speeders, Sweeney said.

In the same months this year, there have been only 70 truck accidents on that five-mile stretch. “When we’re out there in view, it’s a big deterrent,” Sweeney said.

And when the commercial enforcement officers aren’t waiting behind the bend for their next big rig to come barreling through, they are parked at the truck inspection stations, looking to put unsafe trucks and drivers out of service.

CHP officials say mechanical malfunctions are becoming rarer in truck-related crashes, but they vow to keep up the roadside inspections, saying they are looking not only for faulty brakes and worn tires but drivers in need of rest.

“We can look up and visually make eye contact with every individual who comes through here,” said Officer Steve Howe, as he worked a truck inspection post on the Antelope Valley Freeway recently. “You can pretty much tell by making eye contact what physical condition the individual is in.”

Fatigue is indeed the No. 1 underlying cause of truck-at-fault accidents, said Barry Broad, a Teamsters union lobbyist in Sacramento. Truckers sometimes carry two log books, he said, one with factual accounts of where they’ve stopped, how many hours they’ve driven and how many they’ve slept, and another--showing much more sleep--for police inspectors.

Union truckers have no problem with the CHP enforcing the law, Broad said, and more effort should be spent cracking down on fatigued truckers who falsify log books. The Teamsters have traditionally supported such crackdowns, which combat the economic advantage nonunion drivers get by not following the rest requirements in union contracts.

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Trucks are safer than they were just 10 years ago, Howe said, but inspectors still put many out of service until a mechanic can fix a problem.

The truckers have mixed reactions.

“You’re happy because you know you won’t hurt anybody, but sometimes they get ticky-tacky,” said Lee James, 26, of Victorville, whose tractor-trailer was pulled over on the northbound Antelope Valley Freeway for having faulty brakes.

“But it’s their job, it’s for safety,” he said. “You don’t want to kill somebody.”

John Moss, 38, of Reseda was ordered off the road because he was driving with a suspended license.

“Normally this [station] is closed,” Moss said. “My license just got suspended and I was taking a chance that this was closed.”

“I’ve never seen a truck stop pull over so many trucks,” Moss said with a sigh.