Trucker Training Proposal Pulls in Late

The proposal notes that some drivers are trained by big motor carriers who want to hire them. Other new entrants voluntarily attend and pay for one of 200 truck-driving schools and programs across the country.

Safety groups and Congress have pushed the Transportation Department since a 1991 law required the agency to determine the adequacy of driver training. Besides the fatalities, truck crashes caused 106,000 injuries in 2006, according to government figures. Industry experts said the highest risk of an accident is in the first two years of driving.

"They get cousin Jake to show them how to operate the rig," said Gerald Donaldson, senior research director for Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, a nonprofit safety group in Washington whose suit over the 2004 rule led to the revision. "Then the terrifying thought is they learn by doing."

Federal regulators have known since 1995, when they published a three-volume "Adequacy Report," that some drivers weren't properly trained and that only 9 percent of motor carriers offered sufficient training. The study also said driving time on streets and highways was essential to training.

The safety group and the owner-operators sued after the 2004 rule ignored the training issue and focused on driver wellness and qualifications, legal limits on drive time and whistle-blower protections.

"Our eyeballs fell out and bounced off the floor," Donaldson recalled.

In 2005, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia told the agency to write another rule.

"The final rule inexplicably ignores the Adequacy Report and the regulatory prescriptions contained in that report," the opinion said. "The agency has adopted a rule with little apparent connection to the inadequacies it purports to address."

Donaldson sees shortcomings in the new rule, too. It wouldn't cover new drivers until three years after its effective date. It pertains only to interstate drivers, and less training is required for drivers of other trucks and interstate buses.

"We are trying to respond to the court's concerns and provide highway safety," said Hill, of the Motor Carrier Safety Administration. "This is a big departure from the previous rule."

Cindy Skrzycki is a regulatory columnist for Bloomberg News. She can be reached atcskrzycki@bloomberg.net.