The dash-cam video posted on TikTok shows a big semi heading eastward, steaming along on the Deltaport overpass.
Then another semi pulls out from behind the first, crossing the double solid line and heading into the oncoming lane. The driver then corrects and pulls back, narrowly avoiding a head-on crash.
The incident likely was upsetting for the driver in the oncoming vehicle who recorded the video and it was also upsetting for Delta Police, who received a copy of the video on Oct. 19.
Police posted the video on Facebook and Twitter and checked vehicle movement records with Deltaport and located the driver. He was fined $368 for driving without due care and attention and another $109 for crossing a double solid line, as well as handed nine demerit points on his driver’s licence.
Acting Insp. James Sandberg said that tracking down the driver, who later admitted to the incident, involved some leg work but it wasn’t complex.
“If we have a date and a time, we can narrow it down,” he said. “Deltaport staff even come to recognize vehicles after a while. They’re focused on public safety so, for those reasons, they’ll work with us.”
Sandberg wouldn’t say that there’s been an increase in careless commercial driving but noted there are more dash-cam videos of such incidents.
“It might be being brought to our attention more,” he said.
He added that many people complain about the low fines for such incidents, but it’s the legislation that determines the penalties.
One check on driver behaviour is the National Safety Code number that’s issued to each trucking company.
Sandberg said if that number keeps appearing via incidents or fines, the company could lose its trucking licence.
“So that’s a way of keeping the companies accountable and saying it’s not your drivers – it’s company culture, it’s company attitude or what have you,” Sandberg added.
Dave Earle, with the B.C. Trucking Association, said one way to improve trucking safety is by publicizing the names of drivers and companies who repeatedly operate recklessly, just as court records are public information.
“Tell us who these players are so that we can make better decisions and hopefully have a bit of pressure to be felt on them,” he said.
He said such incidents are not common.
“If it happens once, that’s one time too many,” he added.
There is now improved training and enforcement in the trucking industry, said Earle.
“But at the end of the day, we rely on the professional judgment of the driver. And in this circumstance, there was none. Let’s be clear.”
He noted that with the nine demerit points, there’s also an $800 ICBC surcharge.
Following the truck-bus crash in Humboldt, Sask., in April 2018, which killed 10 players and six staff of the Humboldt Broncos hockey team, a national training system has become mandatory across Canada for new drivers.
The mandatory entry-level training system requires 140 hours of professional in-class, on- the-road and parking lot instruction for new drivers, followed by a road test for a Class 1 licence.
But that’s just the basic, first step, Earle said.
It’s up to each company to ensure that drivers are all trained on the equipment they’ll be operating, he said.
Delta Police regularly team up with other police agencies, such as Vancouver police, Surrey RCMP or New Westminster, to conduct safety checks of commercial vehicles. The most recent took place in Deltaport on Nov. 7 where 48 tickets were written and 34 notices issued or vehicles were taken out of service.
