Hacker News Reader

Comment by twistedpair | Hacker News Reader

You just need to remember that a small number of people are just not going to get it. Mostly truck drivers that are dead tired. That water screen does the trick because you're not expecting it. Signs, bumps, and noises are all common to highway driving.

In Boston a few months ago a coach bus had the top ripped off going under a 10ft bridge on a road that truck/bus traffic is banned from. The driver hit several low bars and signs and plowed onward until the bridge cut the top off. Several times a year this happens on Storrow Drive, despite all the warning devices as some drivers just can't be reached.

http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/local_coverage/2013/02/...

View on HN

"Mostly truck drivers that are dead tired."

This. People don't even realize how important it is that people operating heavy machinery are well rested, and sometimes even put down appropriate regulations as just "worker's issues". Then you get a sleepy, bored guy on a highway, with neither awareness to spot dangerous situations, or willpower left to restrain from doing stupid things. It's a testament to how good they are at their jobs that they get to their destinations at all.

I wonder if it would help to put some sort of heart rate monitor or something on the drivers, some way to detect that they are bone tired and require the companies to let them sleep.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5708857

And that's why the EU every truck needs to be legally fitted with a Tachometer that measures every parameter of a vehicle, and a truck driver cannot legally drive for more than 8 hours (I think they can do 9 hours once per week, and they need a 24h break at least once per week as well) - after that, they need at least 8 hour break, when the vehicle cannot move. If the truck is stopped by the police,and they find that the driver has been driving over the time limit in the past 3 months, they will issue a massive, multi-thousand euro fine, so it's extremely rare for drivers to work overtime.

I knew a driver who drove for loading at a company, and because it was taking them too long, his time for a break started before they finished. He refused to move the truck from the spot for a whole 8 hours,even though it was blocking the warehouse - he knew that if he moved it even a little bit, he(and the company he worked for) could be fined several thousand euros months down the line.

Actually I'm from EU country(-ie, actually), and it works... inconsistently. There's fraud, and there's shifting the blame on drivers while trying pressuring them to take the risks anyway (works especially 'well' in countries where many truck drivers are self-employed, like, say, Poland).

And then you get a Polish bus driver with a bus full of people going for a pilgrimage through Swiss Alps, which then fills the news for a week in two countries.

It's way better than nothing, though, and the deficiencies are something that should be fixed even within existing law (e.g. the "self-employment" could really easily be proved to be actually a normal job, if the prosecution cared enough).

These restrictions exist in Australia as well. They sometimes need to refund the drivers if they get fined due to a traffic lockup.

That's the beauty of the metal bar 10m before the tunnel: they won't fail to notice when it acts as a can opener on their truck's cabin, and it only costs a metal bar in public infrastructure (plus towing a cabriolet truck out of the way)

Violently ripping off the top of the actual cabin at speed sound like a way to have a good go at killing the driver.

we had a fatal bus crash at the Miami airport back in december due to the driver not heeding the signs .

http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/12/04/3126826/details-emerge...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com