Considering that “every seven seconds someone is hurt in a car crash” 1 in the United States, I would say that the risks we face each and every day on the roadway is something we all underestimate. Although the vehicles themselves have become much safer, people’s behaviors and distractions have not. While technology is continuously being developed to compensate for the lack of attention that drivers are paying to the road, those of us managing fleet safety need to come to terms with the fact that “what we’ve always done” is not good enough.

In my case, working within the ready mix concrete industry provides unique road safety challenges including the ongoing issues with mixer truck rollovers. Most people would be shocked to know how easily these trucks can have this catastrophic event. A mixer truck weighs over 70,000 pounds loaded and has a high, offset center of gravity due to the configuration of the truck and its heavy, fluid, rotating load. Industry training materials are used to show that a mixer truck can tip up on two wheels when making a 90-degree turn on level pavement at 12 miles per hour and can begin to roll over at only 16 miles per hour.

Each year, the National Ready Mix Concrete Association (NRMCA) conducts various surveys for the industry and in past years, some reports showed a rollover rate of around one out of every 100 mixer trucks2. In regards to cost, the NRMCA states that most rollovers cost around $63,000.3 However, the trend we are witnessing is that they are costing over $100,000 per event, and that is not including any third-party claims. With around 60,000 mixer trucks operating in the United States4 alone, the exposure and consequences for not addressing this issue is worth considering.

Recent results from a NRMCA report showed that drivers who have between one and five years of experience are at the highest risk of a rollover. In our current day and age, we are seeing more people expecting immediate results, immediate credibility, and immediate success. Is it inaccurate to suggest that these drivers are expecting immediate master skill-level? The NRMCA suggests that “one explanation is that new drivers are more cautious when driving a mixer truck, but once they have some experience (6 months – 1 year), they become careless.”3 In my opinion, I believe they become prematurely confident.

The fact of the matter is that we should not be comfortable with these statistics nor the little progress that has been made over the years in terms of preventing these incidents. In fact, we should be taking a good, hard look at our efforts to address this global issue and be willing to think outside the box to pursue solutions that will impact these numbers to the point where it is a non-issue.

At Argos, we have a rigorous training program for both our newly hired mixer truck drivers, as well as our seasoned drivers. Perhaps this training program is more extensive than most, but the training style is common—classroom training by a certified instructor, hands-on, ride-a-longs, and other elements for the new drivers—all of which are tailored to their role in our industry.

In regards to rollover prevention, we have gone so far as to construct an additional feature to our obstacle courses for drivers. This allows them to safely feel how a mixer truck leans using a specially designed slope. In addition, our instructors are certified to the level of Smith System DriverTrainer™ and apply the Smith5Keys®, which are designed to provide drivers with the knowledge and skills needed while driving by:

• Aiming high in steering
• Getting the big picture
• Keeping your eyes moving
• Leaving yourself an out
• Making sure other drivers or pedestrians see you

In further pursuit of addressing the risky behavior of our drivers, Argos has begun to explore the use of technology to help mitigate risk and promote road safety with our drivers. “Dash cams” designed for commercial vehicles, for instance, is one piece of technology that we are using to help monitor certain variables—anything from seatbelt usage to collisions to other unsafe behaviors that may lead to an incident. With this data, we can monitor trends and conduct one-on-one coaching in an attempt to influence negative behaviors and reinforce the positive ones.

In addition to more commonplace technology like dash cams, Argos is proud to be the first within the industry to create a Mixer Truck Driving Simulator like no other, which uses virtual reality (VR) to give our mixer truck drivers a one-of-a-kind safety training experience that they will not soon forget. The simulator was custom-designed to give employees the feeling of actually driving a mixer truck within the safety of a controlled environment.

There are a number of reasons why I believe the ready mix concrete industry lags in its safety programs, especially as it relates to integrated technology. Typical companies in the industry are not in a position to pay for the development of a solution they are unfamiliar with or for something that they are not sure will succeed. Also, if a solution was implemented, the use and maintenance of it would require additional resources and, in all actuality, the solution itself typically remains outside the scope of the business. There are also times when a solution is implemented but eventually collapses or is dropped because it did not generate value as expected, and so any previous attempts at innovative solutions were met with disappointing results.

In my experience—and I’ll venture to guess that most would agree—classroom training and slideshow presentations are not going to drive significant change in behavior. Understanding that technology, also, may not change behavior independently, we are using it in a somewhat disruptive way in conjunction with those conventional sessions. At Argos, we are choosing to embrace and invest in technology to create these all-too-real, shocking, scary, uneasy moments in the confines of a controlled environment so that our drivers are hungrier to learn and retain the content they receive in their conventional training. A mixer truck is unlike any other vehicle and when not respected, the consequences are a matter of life or death. As an industry—no matter how we do it—we need to get that point across.

The unanimously positive feedback from our Mixer Truck Driving Simulator supports that we are definitely on the right track. We have had drivers with both 0 to 20+ years in the industry tell us that, as a direct result of going through the driving simulator and debrief session, they now think differently about how they enter a curve in the road or going down steep grades, and it has caused them to adjust some of their driving habits. They are changing their behavior! We have had drivers say that this was an experience they would always remember, and that, if this did not change the attitude of drivers, nothing would. We have had drivers in training with no experience leave this simulation with a more receptive mind and increased respect for their new job.

The cost of safety is real, but the price of not pursuing solutions that create a safer working environment for our employees and for the general public is too substantial to ignore. Argos will continue to pursue solutions for problems that generate real value, real change, and in this case, safer roadways for our families and yours.

CITATIONS

1National Safety Council (NSC) https://www.nsc.org/road-safety/safety-topics/fatality-estimates

22012 National Ready Mixed Concrete Association Fleet Benchmarking and Costs Survey, https://www.nrmca.org/operations/Documents/2012FleetSurveyFinalRepot.pdf

3NRMCA Concrete In Focus 2017 Rollover Summary, Summer 2018

4NRMCA Ready Mixed Concrete Production Statistics, https://www.nrmca.org/concrete/data.asp