It’s hard to put a price on safety. But I’ll bet you’ve got a pretty good idea of how much your last accident cost.
There’s plenty of technology that can help prevent accidents, but if you buy it, how do you know an accident would have happened without it? You don’t. Even your drivers might not know. And if they did, they’re not likely to tell you they were bailed out of trouble by technology. That’s why, historically, safety has been a hard sell.
Still, learn what’s out there. You can bet sharp lawyers do. And in court, if they can show that there is a technology that might have prevented an accident, but it wasn’t installed on the truck involved, it’s not going to help the owner’s case. Can you say “best business practices”?
At any rate, here are some examples of accident-avoidance technologies – they recently were demonstrated on Delphi’s Safety Truck at the annual meeting of the Technology & Maintenance Council.
Of course, Delphi’s truck is a concept vehicle. And it’s unlikely that any fleet is going to buy all these devices for all of its trucks. The demonstration simply offered a smorgasbord of food for thought. These and other technologies don’t come cheap – but they could save equipment, property and maybe lives.
What’s that worth?
