The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) recently scheduled this year’s Brake Safety Week for Aug. 22-28. This annual event aims to emphasize the importance of ensuring sufficient brake systems in commercial motor vehicles (CMVs). Specifically, the event highlights the role that brake maintenance and efficiency plays in reducing brake-related CMV accidents on the road.

The focus of this year’s event is brake hoses and tubing. During this week-long initiative, certified vehicle inspectors will review CMVs using the CVSA’s North American out-of-service criteria and remove any CMVs with brake-related violations from the roadways. Conducting these inspections, identifying brake-related violations and placing unsafe CMVs out of service is important because:

• Over a third (38.6%) of all CMV out-of-service conditions were caused by brake system and adjustment violations during last year’s International Roadcheck inspection and enforcement initiative.
• The third most cited vehicle-related factor among fatal CMV and passenger vehicle crashes was brake system failures, according to a recent Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) report.
• Eight out of the FMCSA’s top 20 vehicle violations in 2020 were brake-related.
• More than 10% of the 43,565 CMVs inspected were placed out of service for brake-related issues during last year’s Brake Safety Week.

The CVSA consistently schedules Brake Safety Week in August, in conjunction with Brake Safety Awareness Month. The announcement of the event takes place in advance to allot time for motor carriers, commercial drivers and mechanics to assess and service their vehicles—thus ensuring their CMVs (especially their brake systems) are in safe working condition while out on the roadways.

At the conclusion of Brake Safety Week, inspectors will combine all the data they collected and submit the results to the CVSA. The CVSA will then report its findings later in the year.

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