What Does Safe Driver Week Mean for Truck Drivers?

In the trucking industry, safety is a driver’s number one priority. As a truck driver, your goal is to deliver your goods on time and safely without harming other drivers or goods. Between federal, state, local laws and carrier safety guidelines, everyone is working together to help make safer roadways for all drivers. Many drivers take pride in their safety measures and want to continue delivering goods safely.

Each year the CVSA pushes to keep safe driving a top priority for all drivers. This year, in July, the CVSA conducts Safe Driver Week 2021 from July 11th – July 17th. So, what does this mean for truck drivers, and how can they continue trucking down the road safely? Continue reading below to learn more about Safe Driver Week 2021.

What is Safe Driver Week

The CVSA conducts a program known as Operation Safe Driver Week. This program is put together to help lower the risk of fatalities and injuries involving commercial vehicles, including large trucks, buses, and cars. The CVSA works with state, local, provincial, territorial, and federal commercial motor vehicle safety enforcers and industry representatives to ensure safe and effective operation.

Operation Safe Driver Week began in 2007. This operation occurs once a year for one week to reduce the number of deaths and to help educate drivers about safety out on the roadways.

Operation Safe Driver includes:

• Enforce seat belt usage.

• Enforce driver roadside inspection.

• Improve driver compliance.

• Increase commercial and non-commercial vehicle traffic enforcement.

• Executing driver education and awareness to trucking carriers.

• Educating young individuals regarding safety and sharing the road with large trucks.

• Help bring awareness to the public about safe driving operations regarding commercial motor vehicles.

What to Expect from Safe Driver Week 2021?

During the week of July 11th – July 17th, Safe Driver Week will be happening across the United States. Law enforcement will be working hard to enforce safety and education towards unsafe driving by passenger vehicles and commercial vehicles. Law enforcement will be enforcing safety in the United States, Canada, and Mexico to enforce traffic safety, seat belt safety, driver roadside inspections, and compliance.

The focus for Operation Safe Driver Week will be speeding because of the following data records:

• Data shows that increasing your speed by ten mph can risk a car accident by 9.1%.

• Speeding was the main cause of 26% of traffic deaths in 2018. This 26% equals 9,378 people, or an average of 25 people each day.

• The number one citation in fatal highway crashes is speeding.

Past Safe Driver Week Results

Law enforcement officers monitored 66,421 drivers who were participating in unsafe driving behaviors. Out of these 66,421 drivers, 71,343 warnings and citations were issued. While there were challenges because of the pandemic, 3,681 law enforcement officers and 55 Canadian and the United States interacted with 29,921 commercial drivers and 36,500 passenger drivers.

There was a total of 4,119 individuals who lost their lives because of large truck accidents in 2019. Out of this number, 16% of these fatalities were truck drivers, and 67% were either passengers or passenger vehicles.

According to CVSA Director of Enforcement Programs, Jake Elovitra states, “Law enforcement is looking at all vehicle operations in and around a commercial motor vehicle. Several reports have shown that a passenger car was responsible for most fatal crashes with large trucks and buses. Operation Safe Driver emphasizes the importance to passenger car operators driving safely around commercial motor vehicles because of the inherent longer stopping distances and truck driver blind spots.”

Every day should be a safe driver day, not just one week out of the year. Pay attention to your surroundings and be sure to give yourself enough room if you need to brake quickly. Keep trucking and stay safe!