Truck driver had multiple violations prior to Humboldt bus collision

by Truck News-West

MELFORT, Sask. – A document presented during the sentencing hearing for the truck driver involved in the Humboldt tragedy indicates he committed 70 violations during the 11 days leading up to the April 6 collision.

Several media outlets attending the hearing reported that a Saskatchewan government report said Jaskirat Singh Sidhu should not have been permitted to operate a truck when he ran a stop sign causing the collision with the Humboldt Broncos team bus.

An RCMP Forensic Collision Reconstruction Report made available in court Jan. 28 revealed the violations, which were primarily for missing information in the driver logbook.

Families of the victims are currently presenting impact statements in court as part of the sentencing hearing, which will conclude this Friday.


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  • Geez … As is he didn’t have enough problems, now the poor guy is going to hang because of form and matter violations like didn’t write in the bill of lading number, or wrote truck number then license plate number instead of the other way around, etc., etc., etc.
    Makes the ELD look pretty good now doesn’t it?

  • I have been driving transport for 50 years and all kinds of units and have never got a violation . And the way I see it is that drivers would abide by the law accidents like this should never occure. Drivers that go against the rules of the road like this accident should be penalized to the extent of the law and should have his permit taken away for a long time or maybe not be able to drive trucks again.The owner has got to be charged also for not watching his operation as to checking his log books and making sure that his paperwork is in proper order.

  • Where can we find a list of those violations? Are there serious ones or are they mostly form & manner violations?

  • This could be a good thing and is a bad thing for the trucking industry. First the bad thing. The bad thing is that the driver probably hasn’t been trained enough and probably doesn’t have enough experience and is now going to pay a hefty price for everything.. Now for the good thing. Now it is time for the trucking industry to pull there heads out of there ASSES. Big companies and small ones have got to stop cutting the rates and dropping the wages. Drivers Wages are way to low. A driver should be making between $110,000.00 to $130,000.00 a year. and that would bring it back up meet the standards of what it should be if it had followed the rate of inflation from back in the 1980’s. Also what the industry is going to have to do is to follow the lead of the Railroad . 12 hour work period and 8 hours off. Pay by the hour. 10th hour call in to dispatch to tell them that you will be out of hours and down in 2 more hours. Pull in to a parking area and shut it down and call a cab. Company pays for the cab to and from a motel and meals. 8 hours off after arriving at the motel. Do that and watch the Government scream about shippers and receivers cost of transportation going through the roof. Time to fight back. Because drivers and companies giving and giving back to Shippers has got to stop. This driver is going to get Royally Screwed in this bad accident. I feel sorry for all the victims of this horrific tragedy. My Condolences to all the people , who it affected.

    • You are 100 percent correct. I was recently told to leave a Walmart warehouse in New York State when the toll road was closed to empty trucks. I informed dispatch they did nothing to help me I got stuck twice going up the hill leaving Walmart D.C. Our company was fined for being late for the next delivery. Any night in which the temp is below minis 10 C we should be able to get a hotel room and we should at the 10 hours mark go on time and a half and 13 hour mark go on double time all truck drivers should be allowed a Max of 17 hours per day if follow up with 10 hours off. No O T.R. truck driver with 3000 hours experience should make less than $27.00 on payroll or $32.90 to a corporate company.

  • How many more deaths in regards to “Commercial Drivers’ in Canada will happen before “driver training” like other trades will be upgraded? The Government and private sector are guilty due to lobbying, by corporations to keep monetary gain at low levels to accomodate cheap labour, and unskilled drivers. Driver shortage will continue until trade classification is manditory in Canada ! – WHAT VALUE IS HUMAN LIFE ? – “50” years in the industry-“no change”.

  • Hello fellow drivers. Before passing judgement on this driver I think it is very important that we know the facts. Is he being hung for a sheep or a lamb? Were these violations such things as missing bill of lading numbers or missing driving hrs. in his 16 hr. window. Has he shown 8 hrs. off duty while actually driving, did driving hrs. correspond with his miles travelled? These are all important factors. I myself have been driving commercial vehicles for 40+ years and I challenge almost any driver to produce a log book without any violations, be it a missing BOL# or even 30 minutes over your 13 hrs of driving due to unavailable rest area or parking spot. This industry is becoming more and more challenging to maintain compliance and still meet schedules and delivery times. Also keep in mind that the dispatcher, fleet manager or whatever each company chooses to call them should have known exactly how many trips, miles or hrs this man was on duty. Yes he deserves to be punished but I say there is lots of blame to go around. Thank You and safe travels!

  • He blew a stop sign.and a horrible tragedy was a result,enforcement has no choice to find everything there is to find because the insurance lawyers will.im on elogs now for 1 year,was on paper for over 20 years,violation free, his document violations would not have prevented this,unless he was at the end of the day and out of hours.i would be much more interested in finding out the amount of complaints, and incident reports at this intersection .from what I understand this intersection had ongoing issues,have the officials ever approached this intersection from the viewpoint of a commercial truck,with the weight speed,and line of sight in mind, I doubt it.the driver has to live with this and should,but in my opinion putting more regulations on an already over regulated industry is just another way for the suits to avoid responsibly.my advice to anyone wanting to drive a truck is don’t, just but a truck or two and find a sucker to warm the seat ,it’s much safer.having said all that I truly am sympathetic to all those involved.

  • I retired in 2002 after driving for 42 years and one of the reasons I retired was the tightening up of Log Books and other stupid regulations that could only be enforced by competent MOT or DOT inspectors. Most of these inspectors were on the take and the others were scared to work in the dark so the scales were closed. Needless to say I drove at night.