FEDERAL MOTOR VEHICLE SAFETY STANDARD NO. 121-AIR BRAKE SYSTEMS TUESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1977 U.S. SENATE, SUBCOMMITTE ON GOVERNMENTAL EFFICIENCY Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in room 3302, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Senator Thomas F. Eagleton (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. Present: Senator Eagleton. Staff present: Hadley Roff, staff director, and Mark Abels, professional staff member. Senator EAGLETON. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. The Subcommittee on Governmental Efficiency and the District of Columbia of the Governmental Affairs Committee is now in session. OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR EAGLETON This subcommittee, with its oversight on governmental efficiency, has a basic goal. It is this: To see that ordinary common sense applies to the way Government makes and enforces its policies, particularly those made in large part out of public view but which may have profound impact on day-to-day life in this country. Of concern, is how decisions get made, on the basis of what information and with what public participation. Of special concern is how decisions directly touch the lives of Americans who may have had no voice in the decisions, or even knowledge as to who is making them or why. For instance, the subcommittee just completed hearings on the National Flood Insurance Program. It now covers about 1.2 million Americans, and soon will cover more than 6 million. Yet, by administrative fiat, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, is about to take over operation of the program, replacing some 130 or so private insurance companies with one of its own subordinate agencies, the Federal Insurance Administration. There were no public hearings. There was no consultation with Congress. There was no effort to ask the people most directly concerned the policyholders. The decision simply was announced by HUD. Daily, Washington churns with decisions that reach right into the pocketbooks and into the homes and into the lives of Americans. Many are promulgated of the bureaucrats, by the bureaucrats, and for the bureaucrats. Frankly, I am suspicious of these Government-knows best decisions. They may be right. They may be necessary. They may serve and protect Americans. But someone should ask, are they truly needed; will people really be helped or hindered; and what can Congress do to eliminate bad or silly regulations. Those are the down-to-earth questions this subcommittee will ask. The subcommittee, which was created earlier this year, as part of the Committee on Governmental Affairs, has a special responsibility to do what people in St. Louis or Kansas City or Los Angeles or Boston or wherever, can't do, and that is bring into the light of day what Government has in store for them. In some respects, the subcommittee is a court of commonsense on how well Government is working. Today, the subcommittee begins two days of hearings into Federal Vehicle Safety Standard No. 121. It is one of countless regulations handed down by Government about which most Americans know little or nothing, but which can impact directly on their lives. The standard establishes performance and equipment standards for vehicles equipped with air brakes. It now applies to all trucks and trailers built since 1975. What makes these hearings particularly timely is that the standard is about to be extended to commercial buses on January 1, 1978, and to school buses on April 1, 1978. I have no idea how many millions of persons ride buses each day throughout the United States. Their safety comes first in these hearings. I stand behind no one in my commitment to highway safety. I supported the No. 121 standard when it first came out, and I believe as firmly today as I did then that Government should be aggressive in making cars, trucks and buses as safe as technology can make them. The carnage must be stopped. Last year, 45,525 Americans died in vehicle accidents, 4.034 of them in accidents involving trucks. If there are to be stringent standards for highway safety equipment, there also have to be equally stringent requirements that the equipment actually is safe and dependable and its use can be enforced. With 121, serious questions have been raised both about its technology and its enforcement. The standard provides for computerized antilock systems that electronically control wheel speeds in sudden, emergency stops. Their purpose is to prevent skidding and jackknifing, but differences have developed within Government over the systems. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration first published the standard in 1970 and, after numerous changes, finally mandated it for trucks and buses in 1975. Within months, it suspended the antilock provision for buses only now to consider its reapplication in 1978. Meanwhile, its sister agency at the Department of Transportation, the Bureau of Motor Carrier Safety, is not requiring truckers to keep the computerized devices hooked up, and the Army is flatly refusing to equip its commercial trucks with the system. From the standpoint of governmental efficiency, the process by which governmental agencies promulgate and test and enforce safety standards is, of course, of great concern. It becomes all the more so when agencies, supposedly charged with making our highways safe, openly differ about an important safety standard. Of immediate concern is whether Government moved too swiftly to impose an unproven technology on trucks, and now may be doing the same with buses. Frankly, I don't want senior citizens, commuters and others, who daily may depend on buses to go shopping or to get to work, to get aboard vehicles with questionable safety equipment. And certainly, I don't want to put a million or more youngsters aboard schoolbuses each day if there is likelihood brakes could fail and the vehicles could skid out of control. Among persons who own trucks and buses and among those who drive them, repair them and police them, there is certainly heated controversy over the 121 issue. Of them, this subcommittee will be asking: What is the safety record for the electronic systems on trucks? Should they be required for buses? How has the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration made its evaluations and come to its conclusions about the standard, and why do other agencies differ? Is there a better way for Government efficiency to regulate highway safety? What, if anything, should Congress do to improve highway safety? To assure an impartial and balanced hearing, we have asked for witnesses not only from the Government safety agencies, but from all sides of the issue within the truck and bus industry, including owners, drivers, manufacturers of the electronic systems and researchers. I am told that Mr. John Snow is now with us. He has to catch a plane and Ms. Claybrook has agreed to accommodate Mr. Snow and let him appear first. He is the previous Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Mr. Snow. TESTIMONY OF JOHN SNOW, FORMER ADMINISTRATOR, NATIONAL HIGHWAY TRAFFIC SAFETY ADMINISTRATION Mr. SNOW. Thank you very much, Senator, and I thank Ms. Claybrook for accommodating me this way. I am pleased to be with you today and hope that my testimony will contribute to the committee's consideration of the Federal air brake standard applicable to trucks and buses-FMSS-121. I commend you for undertaking this review. From July 1976, to March 1977, I served as the Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the agency responsible for issuing FMVSS-121. I should add that before coming to NHTSA I served for 4 years in the Department of Transportation and thus came to NHTSA with some familiarity with the agency's programs and activities. One of the most contentious issues which I inherited at the NHTSA was FMVSS-121. The standard established significantly improved performance requirements for buses and truck tractors and trailers. While the standard is quite complex, it had two major features. First, it required shorter stopping capabilities on both wet and dry pavements, specifying distances within which a vehicle must stop at different speeds. Of particular importance, and I think the reason that we are here today, it also required the vehicle to stay within a 12-foot-wide lane during the entire stop without significant wheel lockup on the front and the two rear axles. The purpose of the standard was to "in sure safe braking performance under normal and emergency conditions." The standard significantly affected the manufacture of truck airbrakes. To meet the standard, manufacturers equipped the vehicles with heavier front axle assemblies, bigger front brakes, new lining materials, higher capacity and faster acting air systems, new valving and new electronic systems. Of particular significance, it also brought about the widespread use of computer-controlled antiskid braking systems. These systems consist of three main parts. First, a sensing device which measures wheel speed. Its signals a small computer which determines when wheel speed readings require correct braking action. Finally, there is an air valve which takes the computer's commands and regulates brake air pressure for antiskid operation. This is done essentially by dumping some air pressure. The antiskid device was designed to moderate braking pressure on the wheel to reduce the risk of lockup which prevents normal braking. Lockup occurs when the braking force being applied on the rolling wheel overpowers the wheel's ability to roll. This, of course, creates a potentially dangerous situation in which the vehicle is skidding out of control. Consideration of this standard began in the late 1960's and, after a tortuous course, filled with delay, postponement, and innumerable modifications, it finally became effective on January 1, 1975 for truck trailers and on March 1, 1975 for truck tractors and buses. Various extensions have been granted with respect to the buses and the standard is not scheduled to go into effect until sometime in 1978. Vehicles manufactured after the applicable date were legally required to be in conformance with the standard. The most contentious aspect of the standard has been the antilock requirement which forbids lockup of any wheel in stops from above 10 miles per hour "except for controlled lockup of wheels allowed by an antilock system." It is this requirement which led to the use of computer-controlled, electronic brake systems as standard equipment on trucks manufactured after the applicable date. FMVSS-121 did not specifically mandate the use of computerized antilock systems, but this was the only known technology by which the standard could be met. Some critics have argued that in effect it did mandate a specific design. That is a question pending in the Court of Appeals in the Ninth Circuit today. Prior to coming to NHTSA I had been aware in a general way of the controversy surrounding the 121 standard. I knew, for instance, that Jim Gregory, who preceded me as administrator and whose views I greatly respected, was a strong advocate of the standard. I talked with Jim on the matter many times and I greatly respected his views and competence. I was aware that NHTSA had encountered many problems along the way to issuing the standard. I knew that the Council on Wage Price Stability had been critical of the analytical work and the data underlying the standard. I was also aware of the fact that the California Highway Patrol questioned the wisdom of the standard while the Teamsters generally supported it. Moreover, I was generally familiar with the trucking industry's argument that antilock devices were not reliable, that they had not been adequately tested, and that they were unnecessary. I was also aware that the antilock technology had many technically competent supporters. I knew that the standard had been challenged in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals where action was pending and realized that that standard was one of the most far-reaching and controversial regulations ever issued by NHTSA-certainly the most significant truck regulation ever issued. I was also aware that there were some pending issues with respect to applying the standard to the bus industry where several extensions had already been granted. I was aware that there were strong and competent supporters as well as many bitter and able critics of the standard. Thus I came to the agency with a sense of the intense feelings on the issue, an awareness that the issue was still alive, and a realization that I needed to become better informed on the matter. I did not at that time have any opinion on the ultimate merits of the controversy. Given these circumstances, I initiated a review of the standard early in my tenure. An outside, independent consultant with extensive familiarity with trucking issues was retained and a small task force within NHTSA was established to look into the matter. In addition to me, the task force included my special assistant and the associate administrator for research and development. Several other highranking officials were also aware of this effort and involved in it, including the deputy administrator, the chief counsel, and the associate administrator for policy and plans, as well as several others. At this initial review stage, I made a conscious decision not to involve the office responsible for issuing the rule. I wanted a fresh review of the matter. In this initial review, we made a number of field trips to truck terminals where spot checks were made on 121 systems on vehicles in use. The consultant was also asked to report on the real world performance of the 121 systems and accompanied us on a number of the field trips. The consultant undertook a study of the experience with the 121 brakes of 60 motor carrier fleets. This review also included an assessment of the truck manufacturers' problems. A major focus of the inquiry at this time was to determine whether the 121 systems performed reliably, whether they were being maintained and whether they were generally operational. I was concerned by reports that the antilock systems were experiencing a very high failure rate and that there was a high incidence of their being disconnected in the industry. In the course of these field trips, I had a number of conversations with truck company maintenance personnel and with drivers of 121equipped vehicles. These field interviews and spot checks were intended to give us a sense of the effectiveness of the 121 systems in the real world in which trucks operate. The early results of both the field trips and the consultant's study indicated that the trucking industry was experiencing serious and genuine problems in keeping the 121 systems operational. In the course of these field trips, I became convinced that many companies in the trucking industry were experiencing these difficulties despite a conscientious effort to maintain their 121 systems. At the same time I realized that some operators in the trucking industry either for reasons of cost, practical feasibility, technical knowledge or otherwise, were not in a position to do the type of maintenance required to keep the systems operational. In any event it was clear that the antilock |