All Trucking sectors 18 2006-2012 Occupational injuries
All Trucking sectors 2006-2012 19 Figure 3. Depicts number of employees by sector with an accepted, compensable claim per total FTE s reported from 2006-2012. Waste Collection 1 in 15 -> Specialized Freight, Movers 1 in 16 -> General Freight, Less than Truckload 1 in 19 -> Falls from elevation Falls from same level Strains, sprain and overexertion Other Struck-by Vehicles All Trucking Sectors 1 in 19 -> Specialized Freight 1 in 20 -> General Freight, Truckload 1 in 21 -> Couriers & Messengers 1 in 25 -> All Self-Insured and State Fund 1 in 54 -> 1 out of every 19 trucking industry employees had an accepted, compensable claim during 2006-2012. This is more than twice the rate of compensable claims in all other industries.
All Trucking sectors 20 2006-2012 Non-fatal injuries to Washington s trucking industry workforce For the 33,000 workers employed in the trucking industry each year from 2006 through 2012, there were: 6,903 lost work time claims; that s 987 claims per year 1.5 million days of lost work; that s over 8 million hours of lost work or 612 workers not working each year The total workers compensation cost for these injuries was more than $316 million or the cost of an additional lane on Interstate 5 from Seattle to Joint Base Lewis/McCord (approximately 45 miles).* Figure 4. Percent of compensable claims by trucking industry sector, 2006-2012. Waste Collection 11% Couriers & Messengers 9% Specialized Freight, Movers 8% Specialized Freight 20% General Freight, Less than Truckload 29% General Freight, Truckload 23% *Calculated using data from American Road & Transportation Building Association. http://www.artba.org/about/transportation-faqs/
2006-2012 All Trucking sectors 21 Figure 5. Percent of State Fund compensable claims by occupation, 2006-2012. Driver 73% Material handler 13% Other 7% Drivers make up 73% of compensable claims during the study period (Figure 5). 4% 3% Figure 6 shows rates of time-loss injury claim rates for each trucking sector. For all sectors combined, 5.2 for every 100 workers were off work 4 or more days due to a work-related injury. Figure 6. Compensable claims rate per 100 full-time equivalent (FTE) for each trucking sector 2006-2012 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Waste Collection 6.83 Specialized Freight, Movers 6.09 General Freight, Less than Truckload 5.33 All Trucking 5.17 Specialized Freight 4.89 General Freight, Truckload 4.88 Couriers & Messengers 4.05 All SI and SF 1.86 0
All Trucking sectors 22 2006-2012 Occupational non-fatal injuries The highest median costs: As Figure 7 depicts, management occupations, while having the fewest number of claims, had the highest median costs in vehicle-related compensable claims ($34,110) and strain, sprain or overexertion claims ($21,161). Vehicle service technicians had the highest median costs in fall on the same level injuries ($31,005). Figure 7. Median cost of claims by occupation - all trucking sectors, 2006-2012 $35000 $30000 $25000 $20000 $15000 $10000 $5000 $0 Falls from elevation Falls from same level Strains, sprain and overexertion Other Struck-by Vehicles Driver Material Handlers Management Vehicle Service
2006-2012 All Trucking sectors 23 Occupational non-fatal injuries Who is getting injured? As Figure 8 shows, over 70% of injuries during this period resulted in injuries to drivers, accounting for over 70% of the cost and over 75% of the time-loss days. Figure 8. Percent of compensable claims, time-loss days and medical cost by occupation 80% 70% 60% # TL 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Percent of claims Percent of tl days DRIVER Percent of total medical cost HANDLER MANAGEMENT VEHICLE SERVICE
24 All Trucking sectors 2006-2012 Type of injuries The top injury combinations (looking at both injury type and the source of the injury) are: 1. Overexertion (ranked first in average time-loss days) 2. Sprains to knees, shoulders and backs 3. Falling which result in sprains or broken bones 4. Severe fall from elevation (ranked first in average medical costs) true stories Slowly over the years my shoulder has been hurt due to the nature of flatbed tie down work such as tightening down the load with a winch bar. Bent over to unlatch roll door on trailer and felt stabbing pain. As I pulled down on back door of the truck, the handle broke and I fell backwards about 5 feet injuring my wrist, elbow, shoulder and hip. My hand slipped while pulling the 5th wheel and I fell to the ground injuring my hand when I tried to catch myself.
2006-2012 All Trucking sectors 25 Injury types Figure 9 depicts the 5 most common injury types by the claim count, medical costs and time-loss days in the Washington trucking industry (State Fund compensable claims). Strain, sprain or overexertion claims accounted for 35% of claims, 33% of medical costs and 38% of time-loss among all compensable claims in trucking from 2006-2012. Figure 9. Percent of State Fund non-fatal compensable claims by count, medical cost and time-loss days by type of injury, 2006-2012. 100% 50% 0% * Struck by * Vehicle 8% 10% 11% 13% 23% Total compensable claims 7000 or Avg 1000 per year * Other types * Fall from elevation 16% 11% 18% 35% 33% 13% 12% 10% 11% 13% 10% 17% 38% % of claim count total % of claim medical cost total % of time-loss days total Total medial cost 115 million or Avg 16 million per year Colors depict different injury types and associated percent of total. * Fall from same level * Strain, sprain & overexertion Total time-loss days 1.4 million or Avg 200 thousand per year
Suggested citation: Rauser, Smith and Williams 2014. Trucking Industry: Examining Injuries for Prevention, 2006-2012. SHARP Program, report #90-148-2014. Washington State Department of Labor & Industries, Olympia, Washington. Full Report at www.keeptruckingsafe.org