Highway patrol officers in 13 states are in the middle of a coordinated effort targeting unsafe driving behavior that often leads to crashes involving passenger cars and commercial vehicles.
Participating in the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's Operation SafeDRIVE (Distracted Reckless Impaired Visibility Enforcement) are state police from Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, and Kentucky.
The specialized enforcement effort started Tuesday, Feb. 28 and concludes Thursday, March 2, and is meant to complement national efforts to educate all drivers on safely sharing roads with large trucks.
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According to the FMCSA, the regional SafeDRIVE initiative cracks down on dangerous interstate driving behaviors such as aggressive driving, speeding, tailgating, failing to wear a seat belt, distracted driving, and driving under the influence. During this effort, state police commercial vehicle officers will open scale facilities, ensuring commercial drivers follow safety regulations, including hours of service compliance, commercial driver license compliance, medical certification, and commercial motor vehicle credentialing.
As part of the operation, the FMCSA and state police encourage all motorists to take the following advice:
- Stay out of blind spots: Large trucks and buses have big blind spots on all four sides.
- Pass safely: Make sure you can see the truck driver in their side mirror. Use your turn signals, and don’t linger in the blind spot. Make sure you can see the CMV vehicle in your rearview mirror before pulling in front.
- Don’t cut off large vehicles: It takes a large truck traveling at highway speeds the length of two football fields to stop.
- Don’t tailgate: Tailgating a commercial vehicle puts you in a blind spot.
Operation SafeDRIVE coordinates with a national campaign run by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration called “Our Roads, Our Safety,” which educates all motorists on how to share the road safely.
