Latest HGV news – Nodding off at the wheel

How would you feel to wake up to observe yourself veering into the hard shoulder due to you nodding off at the steering wheel?

This did happen recently to a gentleman from Livingston, West Lothian who fell asleep behind the wheel of his 44 tonne HGV, vehicle travelling at 60 MPH but what the driver didn’t know that he was suffering from a condition called obstructive Sleep Apnoea. 

According to the Sun newspaper there are approximately 300 deaths caused every year due to drivers nodding off at the wheel. With 30,000 people in the UK suffering from OSA, 90 per cent of cases remain undiagnosed.  A poll also revealed one in six HGV drivers have Obstructive Sleep Apnoea.

There have been many cases with HGV drivers falling asleep at the wheel but luckily Mr Connelly from West Lothian said ‘I got the shock of my life. I had fallen asleep and nearly killed myself. I stopped at the nearest services, had a wash, a coffee and a walk around to wake myself up, but I was shaking so badly’.

Mr Connelly was very lucky, when this event happened in his HGV vehicle luckily it was only 5am in the morning so there was little traffic, had it been a bit later on he could have caused a major accident in business rush hour traffic.

At Isis Insurance we want our clients to take best care when driving long distances - make sure you have regular stops. Don’t drive over your recommended hours and have plenty of food and drink you keep your energy levels high.

Keeping the rate of accident down each year should give everyone an advantage on cheaper HGV insurance premiums, and at Isis insurance we always make sure our clients get the best competitive price for their HGV insurance.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 10th, 2010 at 9:42 am and is filed under HGV (Haulage/Truck). You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.