00:00Every time Leah Hughes says goodbye to her truck driver husband before work she fears it could be the last time.
00:10You always stop, pause, really take that time and at the back of your mind he might not come home.
00:16When there's news of a truck crash Leah tries to stay calm and find out as much information as she can.
00:23It's also pretty bad when a picture of the truck goes up before the relatives are even told which frequently happens now in this, everybody's videoing everything.
00:32Drivers say there are multiple factors that contribute to safety.
00:39I think about the weight of the truck I'm in, the weight of the load I'm carrying and think that's a rolling death trap really.
00:50But it's the behaviour of other road users that poses the greatest risk.
00:55When you're driving you think about oncoming traffic and you look at them to say if something happened where's my escape route.
01:06Despite the recent spate of truck crashes trucking organisations say the industry is much safer than it was.
01:15We do have accidents, we don't want any.
01:19But over the last 25 years the number of fatal truck crashes has absolutely plummeted despite a big increase in the amount of freight on the road.
01:28Fatal crashes involving articulated trucks are slowly declining.
01:33But the National Road Safety Strategy shows that fatalities in crashes involving heavy rigid trucks and buses have not reduced in the past decade.
01:42And the strategy suggests that 80% of fatal multiple vehicle crashes involving heavy trucks are not the fault of the truck driver.
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