Saving lives never seems to quite match our usually zealous efforts in saving money; or saving our jobs, for that matter. While safety is one of those never ending objectives, we seem to hear less, see fewer driver training programs, and find that safe-driving incentives in our market are nearly extinct except in a few of the larger, well run companies.

Considering that over a million new cars are registered into the overall fleet market each year (that is one out of every eight new ones) we have a fleet car population of some 2.7 million cars. Now the average car in the U.S. travels just under 10,000 miles per year; and the average fleet car about 28, 000 in the same period. Simple arithmetic shows that the fleet cars are spanning nearly three times the mileage as the average car; and, not so incidentally, are exposed to three times the dangers of accident and mechanical failures. While the industry as a whole he an enviable safety record on a mileage basis there should be vital consideration given toward dusting off old programs and reactivating new ones that will represent an investment in the saving of both lives and monies for your company.

Just when was the last time you learned about a new and innovative program to effectively motivate driver safety? We certainly cannot depend on federal legislation to 'harness' us into safety with belts and air bags. A large share of present day accidents are still human error; and that is where today's alert and conscientious fleet manager can and should be providing innovative safety leadership.

And candidly viewing the entire aspect of accidents, one of the important costs is money. As I see it, it breaks down into two parts. One is the actual physical damage to either or both vehicles; and the other is the precious loss of sales time by the productive driver; either holding hands with a nurse in a hospital or awaiting the repair of his car from some shop. Add that up sometime. The California Highway Patrol study sheds some interesting light on the topic. They found that of 409 fatal single vehicle accidents, 29% of the vehicles involved had one or more mechanical defects. It also could be proved that a full two-thirds of these defects either caused or contributed to the accident.

Based on the fact that in 6.4% of the accidents investigated, a mechanical deficiency was directly responsible, and assuming that one fatality resulted in each accident, we could be laying away some 3500 people for this reason. The more common problems encountered were: braking systems-35% of all defects found; steering systems-26%' tires-21%; and 'other' (lighting, shocks, exhaust systems, and windshield wipers)-18%.

There is an unmistakable message here. Most of the defects could have been detected by simple observation, driver care or proper service. It is forcefully laid upon the shoulders of the fleet manager to convince and motivate his drivers that proper service and personal mechanical attention are paramount to true safety. While heavy pressures have been place on the car makers for safer design, the study clear proves that nearly all defects were attributed to lack of maintenance or to norm wear; not a deficiency in car design or assembly flaws.

Let's hear it for safety; and do something about it.