‘Nawalan ng preno’ an excuse to kill

Transport officials and legislators should not wait for their families to be killed or crippled in road smashups before they act. Rules need to be tightened and fines increased for drivers and vehicle owners to shape up.

Everyday about 35 serious collisions occur nationwide. In a span of only 12 hours starting last Thursday afternoon there were five such tragedies in a section of Luzon. Five motorists perished in Quezon City when a 14-wheeler lorry caromed three slow moving cars, a motorcycle, and a tow truck. The driver alibied that the brakes had failed. Yet rated to carry only up to 20 tons, the lorry was overloaded with 60 tons of steel bars. Metro Manila traffic enforcers claimed they could do nothing as the lorry was then outside their jurisdiction. A lie – for it was then moving downhill from the Quezon City side of the boundary with Rizal province. Traffic was snarled till nightfall.

In Antipolo City, Rizal, the following dawn a truck overloaded with sand smashed head-on a van of vacationers. Two were killed instantly while the rest were maimed. That trucker too claimed to have lost the brakes. Eyewitnesses said he was clearly speeding downhill, and swerving in and out of opposite lanes. He hopped onto another sand truck then fled. Also in Antipolo a jitney crashed onto an electric post, killing three passengers. The sleepy driver blamed the brakes.

In Tarlac seven persons were killed when a truck sideswiped their jitney on the highway. “Nawalan ng preno (The brakes failed),” the speeding trucker claimed. In Albay an overtaking tricycle driver and passenger were killed on colliding with an army truck, also on the highway. One can guess what the tricyclist would have reasoned out had he survived.

In all five cases the drivers clearly were to blame, for speeding, and drunk or drowsy driving. The hauling and utility vehicle owners also were at fault, for letting tires go bald and brakes wear out, and hiring reckless drivers in the first place. Knowing that, officials only shrug. Land transport authorities are required to inspect vehicles before registration and franchising, and test drivers before licensing – but don’t. Stiff fines must be imposed on repeat violators – but aren’t. A national highway safety board is begging to be formed to scrutinize every smashup, pinpoint even negligent officials, and recommend ever stricter laws and rules – but hasn’t been.

Investigators must never accept a driver’s excuse of “nawalan ng preno.” The driver likely was speeding, so the brake couldn’t stop his momentum on time. Or he was distracted, drunk or drugged, and so didn’t step on the brake on time and enough. Basic physics teaches that a vehicle accelerates not just by engine rev but also gravity and weight. A driver who tests ignorant of that has no business being behind the wheel.

“Nawalan ng preno” is also just a shallow attempt to pin the blame on fate and the inanimate discs and pads. Today’s trucks and buses are equipped with fail-safe pneumatic systems, better known as air brakes. Cars also have anti-brake locking, to keep traction instead of skidding. Jitneys and tricycles with substandard brakes must be banned from the roads.

“Nawalan ng preno” was the bus driver’s alibi in smashing onto a boulder, killing 15 and laming 50 students in Tanay, Rizal, last Feb. In truth, as the survivors attested, they already had warned the driver of the odor of burning brake pads, a telltale sign of failure, but were ignored.

“Nawalan ng preno” was what the driver yelled while overtaking on a wet curve of a treacherous mountain pass, suffering a blowout and plunging his overloaded bus into a ravine in Nueva Ecija last Apr. Thirty-four passengers were killed and 40 were crippled.

“Nawalan ng preno” was the excuse of the honking driver of a fuel tanker for ramming a grandma who was crossing a pedestrian lane in a hospital-courthouse silence zone. Formerly a tri-cyclist, he had just obtained a five-year professional license to drive a lorry – with no proof of training.

“Nawalan ng preno” is now a license to kill. It’s no different from bus drivers backing up over the persons they had just hit, to make sure the latter are dead and cannot testify in court. And utility vehicle owners abet them.

Innocents are helpless.

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