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It’s a fact:  Every day 14 Americans are killed in trucker related accidents – scores more injured.  Every day.

It’s also a fact that the average American trucker will not live long enough to collect social security.

What’s that all about and how does that relate to 18 wheelers in accidents?  The answer is sleep, or the lack thereof.  Truckers almost by definition either don’t get proper sleep or suffer a significant sleep disorder – sleep apnea, or both.

The profile of the greatest number of sleep apnea victims, poor diet, overweight, poor health habits, fit the profile of the stereotypical trucker who finds truck stop buffets a contest, and takes less time for sleep than those who aren’t paid by the mile.

National studies report that seven of 10 truck drivers clasify as obese.  One Midwest trucking company recently reported their situation to be worse than that.  Their CEO said he believes almost half of his drivers were classified as being ”morbidly obese.”

An advertisement by the Sleep4Safety.com group in the current issue of national trucking magazine Driver Health(circulation 100,000) proclaims that “death is not a form of retirement” and asks its truck driving readers, “did you know the average trucker will be dead before their 61st birthday?”  Sobering and certainly food for thought as you glance in the rear view mirror at the 18 wheeler closing fast behind y0u.

Sleep4Safety CEO Sigurjon Kristjannson contends an 18 wheel truck piloted by a sleep-deprived driver can be as deadly as a drunk driver going the wrong way on the interstate.  “Imagine,” he suggests, “that three of every 10 truckers you see on the highway today probably have the situational awareness equivalent to having .06 to .08 alcohol in their blood system.  They are, in a very real sense,” he says, “driving intoxicated – not an alcohol fueled intoxication, but one created by chronic sleep deprivation.  “Ask yourself,” he says, “how far and 18 wheeler, traveling 60 miles an hour, travels in that brief moment the driver nods off and what can happen during that time.”

Dr Jeffrey Durmer, Atlanta, identified by the publication as “Dr Sleep” and the Chief Medical Officer at Sleep4Safety urges sleep testing to identify those drivers with sleep apnea problems and then on-the-job treatment.  Driver Health publisher Andy Shefsky writes that his goal is to rise “the average truck driver life expectancy age from just shy of 61 to 77, in line with the average American life expectancy.”

Accomplishing that will require 18 wheel pilots to eat right, exercise, and check to make sure, as basic as it sounds, they’re getting enough good sleep.  And, if not, to accept non-intrusive treatment on the job.

The cost of failing to do so, goes far beyond the equipment repair and replacement to staggering medical bills, soaring insurance rates for the companies to the 14 people who, each day, lose their life in a trucking accident – one of each three being the trucker himself.

Sleep well – and hope that trucker coming up in back of you also did.

Pithy Quotes: “You never know when checkout time is.”  Val Dempsey, CEI, Atlanta

Bud Carter

Senior Chairman Vistage Atlanta

Publisher of the motivational quotes book entitled Chairman Carter’s Collection of Pithy Quotes (Quotes designed to improve your bottom line, or, at the least, your disposition).