OPP and MTO Team Up For Wheel Separation Safety Initiative

Wednesday, 17 February 2016 05:46

The OPP and MTO are holding information sessions at the ONRoutes to spread awareness about wheel separation.

WOODSTOCK - Oxford OPP and MTO officers will be at the Westbound ONRoute outside of Woodstock on Thursday for a public safety initiative.

This is the second and final session they are hosting this week - the first one happened on Tuesday. The safety sessions focus in on commercial vehicles and wheel separation. Assistant Director, Enforcement Operations with the MTO Chris Davies tells Heart FM some of the things they are telling transport operators when it comes to wheel separation:

"All of our commercial drivers in the Province of Ontario are required by law to do a daily trip inspection and that inspection includes things like load security, mechanical fitness of the vehicle, and what we are focusing on today is what they need to do when they are looking at their wheels. So they are looking at tight fasteners and looking for any streaking or wheel clocking."

Davies says they had a great response from truck drivers and the general public during the first session on Tuesday.

"We're finding it very receptive. So the folks that are coming over, they are looking at the components, we've got some faulty components on the table so we can demonstrate what our truck drivers should be looking for, and also we have the public coming out and they are interested in operating around a truck."

Constable Lisa Naranscik tells Heart FM part of the reason they are hosting these sessions is in the past 4 months police have responded to 4 crashes where a tire flew off a Commercial Motor Vehicle.

"There's been a lot of wheels off incidents lately and last fall we had a significant one that occurred on the border of Oxford and Middlesex where a female driver lost her life after a wheel came off and caused the collision."

They will be at the Westbound ONRoute again tomorrow from 9 a.m. to 3 pm.