The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has ordered Two Dayes Trucking and Two Dayes Transport, based in Murfreesboro, NC, to immediately cease operations due to a pattern of serious safety violations demonstrating “substantial and flagrant disregard for federal requirements for vehicle maintenance and repair, driver hours of service, qualifications of drivers, and controlled substance and alcohol use,” according to safety investigators.
An FMCSA investigation following a fatal crash involving Two Dayes Trucking in Murfreesboro on Nov. 12, 2012, determined that the company was operating under a revoked DOT registration and that the company had reincarnated as Two Dayes Transport. Both Two Dayes Trucking and Two Dayes Transport were found to have combined operations that consistently displayed a blatant disregard for vital safety regulations, FMCSA said.
A company truck was “dangerously” backing across a hilly section of US 258 at 5:50 p.m. and was attempting to park in Two Dayes Trucking’s residential driveway. The visibility of the truck was obscured by the dirt covering its reflective tape and it was struck by another vehicle that was wedged under the truck and whose driver was killed in the crash, FMCSA said.
At the time of the fatal wreck, Two Dayes Trucking was operating in violation of a FMCSA order that had revoked the company’s New Entrant registration and had placed the carrier out-of-service for failure to permit a FMCSA safety audit.
A subsequent FMCSA investigation uncovered another carrier, Two Dayes Transport, operating as an incarnate of Two Dayes Trucking out of the same business location, using the same drivers and the same vehicles.
The investigation revealed that Two Dayes Trucking and Two Dayes Transport had amalgamated operations and were operating in disregard of “vital safety regulations” and in willful violation of the FMCSA out-of-service order, the shutdown order says.
Safety violations cited in the shutdown order include:
- The carriers did not have a vehicle maintenance program in place to prevent the operation of unsafe trucks and didn’t have any vehicle records identifying the vehicles that were currently being operated, including company number, make, serial number, year, and tire size.
- The companies had no mechanism for recording the nature and due dates of vehicle inspections and maintenance operations to be performed and didn’t have any maintenance receipts showing that repairs have ever been made on their trucks.
- The companies had no driver drug and alcohol testing program in place whatsoever, and neither of its two current drivers had passed a pre-employment drug test.
- The companies failed to monitor drivers’ hours of service and didn’t require its drivers to prepare and submit all records of duty status.
“Safety is our number one priority,” said FMCSA Administrator Anne Ferro. “If a company’s operations put the lives of the public at risk, we will do everything in our power to shut it down.”
“Safety is not optional if you want to operate a truck on our nation’s roadways,” said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. “We will always take action to protect the safety of the traveling public.”
A copy of the imminent hazard out-of-service order can be viewed at www.fmcsa.dot.gov/documents/about/news/2012/Two_Dayes_Transport_IH_Order_final.pdf
