Truck drivers who push the limits of federal regulations by driving up to 10 consecutive hours more than double their risk of having an accident, according to UC Davis researchers. In a study examining the factors involved in truck accidents, consecutive driving hours was more important than experience, age, night driving and hours off duty prior to the last trip. For the first four hours of driving, trucks have the lowest accident risk. The likelihood of getting in an accident jumps 50 percent after five to seven hours of driving and up to 80 percent in the eighth hour. By the ninth hour of driving -- near the maximum allowed by the 60-year-old regulations -- truck drivers' accident risks rise 130 percent over those first few hours of driving. "In the safety business, 50 percent is a big increase," says Paul Jovanis, a professor of engineering at UC Davis. "It's a little scary to think about an accident risk that high and a trend that strong -- and in some ways we're looking at the best of the industry." Jovanis and his colleagues studied a type of trucking company that hauls loads across country in a relay fashion on a regular schedule between company terminals usually built about nine or 10 hours apart. Because trucks tend to spend more time on non-interstate roads at the end of their trips, Jovanis and his colleagues plan to further refine their accident risk analysis by separating the effect of road design from the influence of continuous driving. Jovanis will present the paper in session No. 13A, at 8:30 a.m. Monday, Jan. 11, at the Sheraton.