OOSC, Part II, Item 7. Safe Loading/Tiedowns - Draining/Leaking of Water from Load

Does the Vehicle Out-of-Service condition under Item 7., Safe Loading / Tie-Downs, apply to water that leaks or drains onto the roadway, and the water is not the commodity, product, or load being transported, but may be present due to rain saturating the product, either during production, storage in a stock pile, or application of the water to further prevent the commodity from blowing? Specifically, this question is concerning aggregate materials including, but not limited to sand, gravel, crushed stone, coal, etc. If water dripping or leaking onto the roadway is considered likely to cause an accident or breakdown, the predicate for application of the Vehicle Out-of-Service Criteria, does the same rule apply to other types of transportation (e.g. water expelled or leaking from a refuse truck, melting ice (water) escaping from a transporter of refrigerated commodities, where ice has been packed between pallets to assist in controlling the temperature)? Does this apply when raining?

Our units are being placed OOS for "Fail To Secure Load/Water From Bed". The OOS Disposition is indicated as \"U\" for Unknown, and appears to be the only Vehicle OOS condition that requires no maintenance to be performed to clear the OOS condition. The commodity is not an "Article of Cargo" by definition. There is no quantitative standard to establish when it is declared cargo, load, or commodity leaking, or is it just water. The Vehicle Out-of-Service Criteria Policy Statement applies to conditions that "likely to cause an accident or breakdown". It is our opinion that the conditions described in this request for interpretation do not meet this test; therefore, the issuance of an OOS Order is not warranted. Manufacturers of end dump and belly dump trailers are not required by FMVSS to produce a water tight unit.

Our request is to seek written interpretation of these OOS Orders issued: (1)specifically describing the applicability to all types of vehicles; (2)establishing applicability during rain; and (3)declaring that the condition appears likely to cause and accident or breakdown. This request for interpretation is limited to the question of whether the issuance of an Out-of-Service Order in these cases is appropriate. I wrote the FMCSA and CVSA on October 1, 2007 asking for their response to this question. There has been no response.