Representatives Cohen, DeSaulnier and Ross and Senators Gillibrand and Lujan Introduce Legislation to Protect Drivers from Fatal Tractor Trailer Accidents

WASHINGTON - U.S. Representatives Steve Cohen (D-TN-9), Mark DeSaulnier (D-CA-10), and Deborah Ross (D-NC-2) and U.S. Senators Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Ben Ray Luján (D-NM) today introduced legislation to help prevent deadly truck underride crashes.

An underride crash occurs when a car slides under a large truck, such as a semi-trailer, during an accident. When these crashes happen, a car's safety features are rendered useless because most of the car slides under the trailer and the trailer undercarriage crashes straight through the windows and into the passengers. The passengers in the car often suffer severe head and neck injuries, including decapitation. These accidents are frequently fatal, even at low speeds and also affect vulnerable road users such as bikers and pedestrians.

Studies and pilot programs show that a simple barrier attached to the lower area of a truck, called an "underride guard," would help prevent a car from sliding underneath a truck in an accident. Under current federal law, unlike the rear of a truck, underride guards are not required to be on the sides or front of trucks. The Stop Underrides Act 2.0 would expand on current restrictions by instructing rulemaking to require side underride guards on new trucks, improving data collection, and directing additional research on underride crashes.

"The Stop Underrides Act 2.0 would help prevent these terrible and too-often fatal truck-trailer accidents by ensuring that cars can no longer slide underneath trucks," said Representative Cohen. "In introducing this legislation, I'm reminded of my constituents Randy and Laurie Higginbotham who lost their son in an underride crash in Memphis in 2014. The Stop Underrides Act 2.0 builds on important progress made in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and will save lives by helping to end these fatal crashes."

"With truck underride collisions claiming the lives of at least 300 people per year, the time to act on reforms is now. Small changes will make a big difference, and we cannot leave any room for error," said Congressman DeSaulnier. "I am proud to join my colleagues in advancing this bill to put an end to these avoidable tragedies."

"Requiring trucks to have underride guards is a simple way to prevent hundreds of deaths on our roads," said Congresswoman Ross. "These guards are a proven, effective safety measure that will reduce underride crashes as well as severe injuries and fatalities caused by underrides. I have heard directly from families in my district about the lives this improvement could save. I'm proud to introduce legislation that will prevent vehicle fatalities and make our roads safer for drivers in North Carolina and across the country."

"Truck underride guards are one of the best and easiest solutions for protecting passengers during collisions with large trucks," said Senator Gillibrand. "The Stop Underrides Act 2.0 is commonsense legislation that will protect passengers and make our roads safer. I look forward to working across the aisle to get this passed."

"I'm proud to join my colleagues in introducing life-saving legislation to make our roads safer," said Senator Luján. "The Stop Underrides Act will help prevent deadly underride crashes and protect families from tragic, preventable loss. I'm grateful for Senator Gillibrand's leadership on this important issue, and I look forward to working with my colleagues to get this bill signed into law."

Specifically, this bill would:

• Require the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to finalize rulemaking requiring side underride guards on commercial trucks.
• Restart the Department of Transportation's (DOT) Advisory Committee on Underride Protection, to provide recommendations for how to reduce underride crashes and severe injuries and fatalities caused by underrides.
• Require the DOT to publish a website making underrides research accessible to researchers, industry, and advocates.
• Instruct the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to conduct a study on the prevalence of underride incidents, including those involving the fronts of large trucks.
• Instruct the Government Accountability Office to conduct a study of the implementation of NHTSA's 2022 rear underride rule and provide suggestions to better improve the rule.
• Instruct NHTSA to review its Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) and correct crashes in the database that should have been classified as an underride but were not.
• Instruct NHTSA to create free, on-demand web-based training for state and local law enforcement to better identify and document underride crashes.

This bill is supported by the Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, America Walks, AnnaLeah & Mary for Truck Safety, Cascade Bicycle Club, Casey Feldman Foundation, Center for Auto Safety, EndDistractedDriving.org, Families for Safe Streets, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, League of American Bicyclists, Institute for Safer Trucking, Kids and Car Safety, Ride Illinois, Ride of Silence, Road Safe America, Sylvia Bingham Fund, Safe Routes Partnership, Stop Underrides, and Truck Safety Coalition.

"We appreciate Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) for her leadership on legislation to reduce preventable deaths and injuries involving large trucks. The Stop Underrides Act 2.0 would help stop devastating underride crashes by advancing research-backed protections which are long overdue. We urge Congress to advance this bill without delay to prevent more people from being horrifically killed or injured in an underride crash," said Cathy Chase, President, Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety.

"I commend Senator Gillibrand and Congressman Cohen for introducing the Stop Underrides Act 2.0," said Jennifer Tierney, Truck Safety Coalition and CRASH Board Member. "I lost my father, James Mooney, in a preventable side underride crash over 40 years ago. It is unconscionable that trailers still are not required to have side underride guards and my heart breaks for every single loss of life that could have otherwise been saved. This bill will save lives."

"The Stop Underrides bill was written to solve the decades old problem of vehicle occupants and vulnerable road users from dying under tractor-trailers. It's not the crash that kills; it's the underride. Underride protection around tractor trailers and large trucks is necessary to save lives," said Lois Durso-Hawkins of the Stop Underrides advocacy group.

"Hundreds of people are killed or injured each year in side underride crashes, a preventable consequence of semitrailer design. Requiring side underride guards on new semitrailers will save lives, protecting motorists and people walking or biking," said Eric Hein, Board Member, Institute for Safer Trucking; bereaved father of Riley Hein.

"I'm grateful to Senators Gillibrand, Lujan, Blumenthal, and Duckworth, as well as Representatives Cohen, DeSaulnier, and Ross for taking this next important step to bring about long overdue underride regulations," said Marianne Karth of AnnaLeah & Mary for Truck Safety. "The provisions in this bill need to become law to bring Americans safely home. I don't want any more families to lose loved ones while engineering solutions gather dust on a shelf."

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