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After the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) reported on a 2010 crash in Missouri involving a large truck and cell phone distraction, the president and CEO of the American Trucking Associations (ATA) Bill Graves stressed once again the need for a ban on cell phone use behind the wheel. Graves urges federal and state lawmakers to extend the ban on texting for commercial vehicle drivers to cover the drivers of all passenger cars.
ATA also supported the ban on cell phone use, meaning not just texting but also dialing and receiving calls, for commercial drivers. Here again, ATA would like to see it extended to all drivers, who are just as much distracted by cell phones and smart phones, as well as truck and bus drivers.
Even though most Virginia drivers applaud a cell phone use ban for truck drivers, it becomes more and more difficult for passenger car drivers to justify their own exemption. Car drivers distracted by handheld phones cause far more crashes and fatalities than those attributed to truck drivers.
The NTSB report points the finger at deficiencies in the way the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) monitors the safety performance of motor carriers. Under the present system, the responsibility of the Missouri truck crash would be attributed to the motor carrier and truck driver and would considerably worsen its safety rating, even though there was virtually nothing that the truck driver could have done to avoid the crash.
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