• 30
  • July
    2010

The North Carolina Highway Patrol recently wrapped up a traffic enforcement effort dubbed Operation Road Watch. The operation was aimed at improving safety and preventing auto accidents on North Carolina roads and focused primarily on issues surrounding large commercial trucks or big rigs.

This was the third year the Highway Patrol conducted the operation and similar efforts are being planned for later this year. The operation ran from early last Tuesday morning through Thursday morning and concentrated on Interstate 77 because it is heavily traveled by commercial traffic.

According to Major W.M. Nichols, director of special operations and motor carrier enforcement for the Highway Patrol, state and local law enforcement conducted checkpoints looking for safety violations, drug or alcohol use, and driver fatigue. Among safety violations, officers looked for discrepancies in logbooks, checked lights and tires, and made sure that trucks had brakes in proper working condition.

Nichols noted that troopers investigated more than 5,500 crashes involving commercial vehicles in 2009. Those crashes resulted in 98 deaths and more than 1,800 injuries. The goal of the operation is to reduce those numbers as much as possible. Rick Cates, of the North Carolina Trucking Association, claimed his organization was supportive of the operation and reiterated that safety is important to everyone, including commercial drivers.

In addition to cracking down on violations committed by semi drivers, law enforcement was also on the lookout for passenger vehicles contributing to dangerous driving conditions. Many drivers tailgate or drive aggressively around large commercial trucks, but they may not realize that the weight and size of these trucks makes them extraordinarily dangerous if involved in an accident with a normal sized car.

Related Resources:

Highway Patrol begins Operation Road Watch (Statesville Record & Landmark)