Driver Hours, Rest Periods and Fatigue Management
This domain is about recognising fatigue before it becomes a crash, and knowing the working-time framework a Jordanian commercial driver works inside.
The legal frame
- Labour Law No. 8 of 1996 sets ordinary working time at 8 hours a day and 48 hours a week, with rest breaks and regulated overtime.
- LTRC operating permits and the transport operator's own rules add limits on continuous driving, daily driving totals and rest between shifts.
- Commercial drivers carry a trip record or log and must be able to produce it at a checkpoint together with the permit.
Recognising fatigue
- Early signs: yawning, heavy eyes, drifting within the lane, missing signs, wandering thoughts, slow reactions.
- Micro-sleeps of a few seconds at 90 km/h cover more than 100 m.
- Risk peaks in the early hours (roughly 02:00–06:00) and mid-afternoon.
- The only real cure is sleep. Coffee, open windows and loud music mask fatigue for minutes, then make the fall sharper.
The correct response
- Take a break of at least 15 minutes after no more than two hours of continuous driving.
- For serious drowsiness, stop somewhere safe and sleep - a 15–20 minute nap beats pushing on.
- Plan the day around the longest legal driving time, not around hope.
Worked example
You started at 04:00, have driven nine and a half hours with short stops, and 300 km remain. You feel alert after coffee. Reasoning: the daily driving limit and the rest requirement decide this, not your feelings. You are close to or beyond the permitted total, so you stop for a proper rest period, log it, and inform the operator that the delivery will be late.
Traps that cost marks
Treating coffee as a substitute for rest; driving on after a micro-sleep "because it was only once"; failing to record stops.