Exhaustion as a factor in road mortality is a concern for the country

A total of seven accidents have claimed the lives of 84 people who were travelling overnight on interprovincial buses on routes that take more than 10 hours.

Between April and July of this year, at least seven significant road incidents involving interprovincial buses have been recorded. These tragedies have resulted in 84 deaths and 122 injuries on the roads leading to Cajamarca, Ayacucho, Amazonas, A lot and Junín.

Continuing to refer to these events as ‘accidents’ is inappropriate, especially when considering the causes that lead to them.

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For example, in 2023, 87,172 traffic accidents were reported, of which 28.1% were due to driver recklessness and 26.4% to speeding, according to the National Road Safety Observatory (ONSV). However, let’s focus on interprovincial buses. These units, which operate formally, leave from a terminal and are under the supervision of the Superintendence of Land Transport (Sutran)They are equipped with GPS, which allows their location and speed to be recorded in real time. With capacity for up to 60 passengers, they undertake journeys that often exceed 10 hours. This activity can be exhausting and inhumane for a single driver, although relays are implemented.

While causes such as speeding and driver negligence are often mentioned, there is one crucial factor that is often overlooked: driver fatigue.

A common pattern in the tragedies described in this report is that they occur between 10 p.m. and 6:30 a.m., and the preliminary cause could be microsleep.

“The driving day is broken down into daytime and nighttime hours. During daytime hours, which start from 6 am to 9:59 pm, you can drive for a maximum of five hours. During nighttime hours, from 10 pm to 5:59 am, you can only drive for a maximum of four hours. Likewise, the rest period must be one hour for both,” he said.