So the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) wants to know if federal and state motor carrier safety personnel (and then all law enforcement) should be able to access your information via an electronic signal being emitted by your commercial vehicle.
Sounds like it would be a passive system that only responds when pinged, but that still doesn’t sit right with me. You would not even have to do anything wrong for the system to check, and worse…you potentially would not know they are pinging you.
CDL Life reports that the FMCSA has issued an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking – ANPRM. In other words, they want to know what you think about this idea prior to making a rule.
The FMCSA claims that it is considering this change to allow “enforcement agencies to focus their efforts at high-risk carriers and drivers.”
Really? How is that?
Sounds more like it will enable ease of targeting. A quick ping lets you know whether or not a driver or carrier has had “issues” in the past. Can anyone guess how this might be abused?
Thank goodness there is an overwhelming “NO” being voiced. Not that it will change minds already made up.
I get the safety aspect. I also like being innocent until proven guilty in all aspects of life. You need to understand that “issues” and “high-risk” can be defined and redefined by those in charge. It is a slippery slope.
Shouldn’t a driver or carrier at least have an event that initiates the search into their background?
What about those injured or killed in accidents, Dude?
The University of Michigan Transportation Research Institution studied 8,309 accidents. These were fatal accidents between cars and trucks. Of those accidents, 81% of the time the driver of the car was cited as at fault. But, let’s pretend that because the vehicle is operating for commercial use it is different.
How long until commercial operation does not matter? Think it can’t change?
No, I am not saying we should allow random pinging of electronic IDs for private citizens either. I am screaming NEITHER!
Take the case of truck driver Bradley Cooley who had a seizure behind the wheel, causing a fatal accident with a car. One of the rare times the fault is on the driver of the truck.
As reported in CDL Life the family of the victims is fighting to get a “loophole” in the CDL process changed.
In this case, it was forged medical documents that they say killed their daughter and grandchildren.
But, in my humble opinion, the issue is that mandatory reporting of seizure history to transportation officials is only observed in six states.
Sounds like an easy fix and a no-brainer.
It also sounds a lot like giving up privacy and rights and not policing the authorities is the flavor of the day.
I don’t know about you but, I don’t like that flavor.
Peace and Love.
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