The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) granted a renewed five-year safety waiver to Grote Industries’ Auxiliary Strobe and Stop Lamp, a brake-activated, pulsating warning light designed to reduce rear-end collisions.
FMCSA’s decision extends the waiver through 2030 and acknowledges the strobe lamp’s role in reducing rear-end collisions. The original 2020 waiver allows motor carriers to equip trailers and van body trucks with a brake-activated, pulsating amber warning lamp in addition to the steady-burning red lamps required by federal regulations.
The lamp is designed to flash amber five times in four seconds when braking, before returning to a steady red state. Grote argues the brief pulsing helps following drivers react sooner without causing confusion or distraction.
Grote said in a news release that since the waiver was first issued, more than 150,000 vehicles have been outfitted with the Grote Auxiliary Strobe and Stop Lamp, logging more than 250 million miles (400 million km) on the road. One large national fleet customer experienced a 33% reduction in rear-end crashes per mile compared to a baseline fleet without the system, based on data from over 1 billion miles (1.6 billion km) driven, the company claims, adding that another large fleet saw a 52% decrease in overall recordable incidents per vehicle and a 75% reduction in incident severity.
“The results speak for themselves,” said Mark Blackford, director of national fleet sales. “When you see reductions of this magnitude – in both the frequency and severity of rear-end collisions – it confirms that this technology is making a measurable difference. The renewal of this waiver allows us to continue supporting fleets with a proven solution that helps improve safety on our roadways.”
