NTSB Asks for Audit of FMCSA
The National Transportation Safety Board has recommended that the government audit the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration because recent accidents raise “serious questions about the oversight of motor carrier investigations.”
NTSB questioned the quality of FMCSA’s compliance checks of the companies, as well as FMCSA’s “increasing reliance” on narrow reviews that examine only a “limited portion of the commercial operation.”
“While FMCSA deserves recognition for putting bad operators out of business, they need to crack down before crashes occur, not just after high-visibility events,” NTSB Chairman Deborah Hersman said in a statement. “Our investigators found that, in many cases, the poor performing company was on FMCSA’s radar for violations but was allowed to continue operating and was not scrutinized closely until they had deadly crashes.”
For additional coverage see the Nov. 11 print edition of Transport Topics.
