FMCSA Finalizes HOS Exemptions For Shorthaul, Munitions Drivers

This story appears in the Nov. 4 print edition of Transport Topics.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has formally amended its hours-of-service rule to exempt shorthaul and munitions drivers from taking a 30-minute rest break after eight hours of driving.

The agency’s Federal Register posting Oct. 28 specifically exempts drivers who operate within 100 miles of their duty location, as well as those who operate within 150 miles of their normal work location and use vehicles that do not require commercial driver licenses.

“We are fully confident safety will not be compromised,” FMCSA spokesman Duane DeBruyne said.

The shorthaul driver exemption provisions were amended in response to an Aug. 2 ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upholding most of the hours rule, but holding that shorthaul drivers should not have to take the break.

Also on Oct. 28, FMCSA followed with a separate rule granting the U.S. Department of Defense Military Surface Deployment and Distribution Command a rest-break exemption for drivers of Department of Defense contract motor carriers and their employee-drivers engaged in the transportation of weapons, munitions and sensitive/classified cargo.

The exempted drivers are allowed to use 30 minutes or more of attendance time to meet the HOS rest-break requirements, provided they do not perform other work during the break.

DOD officials said that granting the exemption will allow driver teams to manage their en route rest periods efficiently and also perform mandated shipment security surveillance, “resulting in both safe driving performance and greater security of cargo during long-distance trips.”

DOD estimated that the rule affects 40 contract carriers with about 1,942 power units and 3,000 drivers.

While the shorthaul exemption is permanent, the military driver exemption is in effect for only two years, ending Oct. 21, 2015.

The agency also said it has yet to decide if it will grant a request to extend the rest-break exemption to drivers who haul live animals and concrete.

“The petitions seeking certain hours-of-service exemptions to truck drivers hauling livestock and concrete are presently under review,” DeBruyne said.

One petition was submitted June 19 by the National Pork Producers Council, which said the mandatory break “will cause livestock producers and their drivers irreparable harm, place the health and welfare of the livestock in their care at risk and provide no apparent increased benefit to public safety.”

An estimated 600,000 pigs that are transported every day on U.S. roads face an assortment of stresses ranging from traffic accidents to variations in temperature, humidity and weather conditions, even death in extreme heat, the council said.

“In fact, the pork industry takes this concern so seriously that standards dictate that a truck carrying livestock should only stop during high temperatures when the animals will be immediately unloaded or when a safety issue compels it,” the council said. “If stopped, drivers need to stay with the animals and provide them water to help cool their bodies.”

The other petition for a driver exemption was filed Aug. 20 by the National Ready Mixed Concrete Association.

The concrete trade group said the industry’s 68,000 drivers almost always spend less than half of their on-duty time actually driving their trucks.

Because concrete is a perishable product, once the ingredients that make up ready-mixed concrete have been mixed there is a window of roughly 90 minutes before the concrete hardens and by specification is no longer usable, the association said.

“Thus, once a delivery is started it must be completed quickly or the concrete may harden in the CMV, causing monetary damage to the company and potentially violating a delivery contract,” the concrete association said.