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Blind Man's Bluff. Essentially a game of tag played by children with a blindfold on. The original name is Blind Man's Buff. Buff is a synonym for a small "push" or "shove."
Dashcams are a brilliant piece of kit. They're simple to operate, relatively inexpensive now, and easy to install. They provide the driver with protection from insurance fraud and provide clear details of traffic in its view. The information is stored and runs on a loop that can be programmed to delete old recordings to free up new recording space.
The videos from these dashcams are making their way onto YouTube and social media hubs.
This is where dash cams are becoming a window for the average citizen to get a first-hand view of the larger part of a trucker's life - the highway. The video snippets provide an insider's view of the daily monotony of driving miles and miles of endless highways. From shipper to receiver.
They show four-wheelers doing the dumbest stunts in front of trucks. And they also show other trucks doing incredibly stupid acts as well.
But dashcams record everything. They don't just record the other operators, they also include the cams owner/driver's behaviour.
Something I've been witnessing with great alarm is the increasing number of "truckers" behaving with little or no regard for the safety of others or themselves. Each day there is new video footage of steering wheel attendants caught on dash cameras doing the most dangerous of acts on our highways. Crossing the centre line is probably the most dangerous thing that can lead to a collision causing death. And these videos are being seen more now than ever. They don't just show the foolish or reckless behavior. They paint every single professional driver with the same viewer's brush. It not only damages the driver's personal record, but it damages the entire industry's integrity.
In many of these short films, neither driver is behaving in a professional manner. Often creating far more dangerous situations by attempting to "teach the other driver a lesson."
Two wrongs in this industry can put innocent people in body bags.
The Mandatory Entry Level Training (MELT) program has missed the mark. Implemented in 2020 following recommendations out of the Humboldt Broncos tragedy, the program only covers new Class 1 drivers. It doesn't address the literally thousands of drivers who couldn't drive a sharp stick up their backsides if they sat on it.
My point is as long as we have drivers on our highways who have no training and no moral compass through a proper industry-regulated trade certification, then we will continue to drive a spike through the heart of this industry. And in doing so, the collision and fatality rate will be on the rise. Playing Blind Man's Buff with commercial vehicles isn't fun. It's not a game out there. It's a dangerous business.
