Reprinted from The Safety Record, Volume 7, Issue 1, April 2010
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Eleven years after the National Transportation Safety Board recommended that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration establish performance standards for school bus occupant protection systems in all types of collisions, the NTSB removed it from the top-ten list of most wanted safety improvements.
The NTSB voted to drop “Enhanced Protection for School Bus Passengers” from the annual list last month, after NHTSA issued a Final Rule that increased seatback height, and established performance specifications for voluntarily installed seat belts.
The agency’s actions actually fell short of the NTSB’s original recommendations, issued in 1999. At that time, the NTSB urged NHTSA to develop performance standards for school bus occupant protection systems that would work in all crash types. Further, and more importantly, the NTSB wanted NHTSA to require such systems in all newly constructed school buses, “including those in child safety restraint systems, within the seating compartment throughout the accident sequence for all accident scenarios.”
NHTSA’s response has been much more limited.
By the NTSB’s timetable, older bus riders have not fared even half as well. In 1999, the NTSB also issued recommendations to improve occupant protection in motor coaches. The board’s original suggestions to NHTSA included a redesign of motor coach window emergency exits for easy egress, stronger roofs and the establishment of an occupant ejection mitigation standard. In 2008, the NTSB rated NHTSA’s progress as “yellow,” indicating slow progress forward, because in 2007 the agency performed a full-scale frontal crash test for research purposes and followed up in 2008 with some roof strength and sled tests. But in lieu of any agency action, the NTSB ranked this most-wanted as red, meaning no real progress.
The designation is ironic, given that U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood has jump-started the agency’s motorcoach safety effort with the November release of an ambitious action plan. Emanating from an April 30 directive to develop an integrated approach to motorcoach safety, the plan encompasses seven actions that would have the greatest impact on improving motorcoach safety. Among the regulatory responsibilities for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) are rulemakings to require electronic on-board recording devices on all motorcoaches to monitor drivers’ hours and fatigue; and to propose prohibiting texting and limiting the use of cellular telephones and other devices by motorcoach drivers. NHTSA would be required to initiate rulemaking to require the installation of seat belts on motor coaches; rulemaking to improve tire performance and establish performance requirements for roof crush and for ESC on motorcoaches.
The NTSB also listed as yellow the prohibition of cell phone use by motor coach drivers. Any such regulation would fall under the jurisdiction of the FMCSA. To date, the agency has only studied the issue in determining if it should establish a regulation limiting cell phone use by commercial drivers. In July 2009, it released the results of a naturalistic driving study it commissioned the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute to do. The FMSCA has taken a more aggressive stance against texting while driving. (See FMCSA Issues Texting Ban; Advocates Say It’s a Good First Step, p. 7 )
Other slow-moving perennials on the top-ten list were: preventing collisions by using enhanced vehicle safety technology and preventing medically unqualified drivers from operating commercial vehicles.
The NTSB said that the FMSCA was not making enough progress in the areas of requiring electronic onboard data recorders for commercial vehicles and in promulgating rules preventing motor carriers from operating if they put vehicles with mechanical problems on the road or unqualified drivers behind the wheel.
