By Tom Latek
Kentucky Today
Kentucky State Police Commercial Vehicle Enforcement (CVE) officers are taking part in a three-day safety blitz, now underway and ending tomorrow, targeting unsafe behavior that often leads to crashes between passenger cars and large trucks.
Operation SafeDRIVE, which stands for Districted Reckless Impaired Visibility Enforcement, is part of a nationwide campaign under the auspices of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to educate all drivers on safely sharing roads with commercial vehicles like semis.
The national SafeDRIVE initiative cracks down on dangerous interstate driving behaviors such as aggressive driving, speeding, tailgating, failing to wear a seat belt, distracted driving, and driving under the influence.
During this effort, KSP Commercial Vehicle Inspectors will open scale facilities, ensuring commercial drivers follow safety regulations, including hours of service compliance, commercial driver license compliance, medical certification, and commercial motor vehicle credentialing.
CVE Sgt. Jason Morris says safety campaigns like this can have a significant positive impact on highway safety.
“It is important to our officers that everyone travels safely on our roadways. Operation SafeDRIVE is an opportunity for us to ensure drivers follow the rules of the road and offer tips to keep drivers protected.”
Morris says he encourages all motorists to take the following advice while driving on the roads:
• Stay out of blind spots: Large trucks and buses have big blind spots on all four sides.
• Pass safely: Make sure you can see the truck driver in their side mirror. Use your turn signals, and don’t linger in the blind spot. Make sure you can see the commercial motor vehicle in your rearview mirror before pulling in front.
• Don’t cut off large vehicles: It takes a large truck traveling at highway speeds the length of two football fields to stop.
• Don’t tailgate: Tailgating a commercial vehicle puts you in a blind spot.
Operation SafeDRIVE is part of an ongoing larger national campaign run by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration called “Our Roads, Our Safety,” which educates all motorists on how to share the road safely.