Report - Tired truckers common

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- Tired truckers endanger other drivers and themselves as they're forced into long hours by low pay, while infrequent government inspections allow them to stay on the road, The Kansas City Star reported.

In a three-day series that concluded Tuesday, the paper found:

Truck-related crashes killed 5,211 people last year, an average of 14 per day. There were 140,000 injuries.

Crashes kill more truckers than workers in any other profession -- 741 truck occupants died last year, according to federal statistics.

Federal inspectors have never visited three-fourths of all carriers. And the average truck travels more than 80,000 miles between stops at roadside government inspection stations. In Kansas, trucks travel an average of 57,938 miles between inspections, ranking the state 17th. Missouri ranked 22nd, with 82,519 miles between inspections.

Star reporter Judy L. Thomas, a former trucker, drove a semi 6,000 miles across 15 states to report the story. She found that fewer than a third of inspection stations were open at all, and none asked to see her logbook. Some truckers said they hadn't been inspected in more than a year.

Trucking officials pointed out that the fatality rate -- the number of fatalities per mile driven by truckers -- is at an all-time low. Truck-related crashes killed 700 fewer people last year than in 1980, even though two million more trucks are on the road.

Industry critics said that's because passenger vehicles are safer -- antilock brakes and air bags have become common.

Most truckers must drive long and hard to make money because they're paid by the mile -- not by the hour.

And unlike almost all other industries, trucking is exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, the law that established a 40-hour workweek. That means truckers don't have to be paid minimum wage -- $5.15 an hour -- or overtime unless they're in a union, but fewer than one-fourth of truckers belong.

As a result, truckers routinely work more than the 60 hours a week and 10 hours at a stretch that federal law allows. And truckers are supposed to be on duty no more than 15 hours per day, with eight hours of sleep. But truckers often falsify their logs to stay on the road longer, the Star reported.

"Sweatshop is a good description," said Keith Stanley, a longtime trucker and father of five, as he gulped coffee to pump some life into his weary body at a truck stop in Fort Stockton, Texas.