The GAO report covers the agency’s 2014-released study on the HOS rule, not the one currently in the works required by a December 2014 DOT-funding act, which also suspended certain portions of the 2013 rule.
The U.S. House’s transportation committee asked the Government Accountability Office to review FMCSA’s study on the 2013 HOS rule.
The GAO reported that the agency had done an OK job designing the study and analyzing data, but had not used guidance outlining specific standards for conducting and reporting results.
The GAO says FMCSA failed to report several limitations and had not fully linked results to its overall conclusions, the GAO stated. The agency agreed with the recommendations, but maintained it had adhered to standard research principles and practices in its January 2014 HOS study.
Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx outlined what the DOT took as a positive from the report, namely that it “provides further evidence that the changes FMCSA made to the HOS rules improve highway safety by saving lives and lowering the risk of driver fatigue. This reinforces our belief that these life-saving measures are critical to keeping people safe on the roads.”
The GAO said FMCSA lacked methodology supporting the study’s objectives and cited the 2013 requirement that drivers take two night-time breaks in their restart as an example. It should have compared fatigue after a one-night and a two-night restart, but instead, compared drivers with one-night restart to those with two or more nights of rest. This could have skewed the results, the GAO wrote.
