What should you check before leaving the yard with dangerous goods?

Most dangerous goods problems found at a roadside check could have been picked up in the yard and only take seconds to fix.

However, they’re expensive once a police officer or dangerous goods enforcement officer finds them; for example, no placards on a placarded load is a $1500 infringement fee.

Your normal pre-start check covers the truck. It doesn’t cover the load, the paperwork or the emergency gear, and those are where dangerous goods drivers get caught out. We’ve put together a printable pre-trip check that covers the extra items, in the order you’d naturally walk around the vehicle:

• documentation and your D endorsement
• placards and where they go
• packaging, segregation and load restraint
• emergency response information, spill kit and fire extinguisher
• the vehicle and the route, including level crossings where you must stop

Download the dangerous goods pre-trip checklist (you must be logged in and have access to the D endorsement course, or have purchased it for one of your drivers). You can modify the checklist to suit your requirements.

3 items that can catch drivers out

The first is the load plan or schedule of quantities on multi-drop runs. Once you’ve dropped half the load, the documents need to match what’s left, not what you started with.

The second is segregation after a mid-run pickup. A pallet collected at your third stop has to be checked against the Schedule 3 chart for everything already on board, including subsidiary risks. If space is tight and it ends up next to something incompatible, you’re the one carrying it.

The third is placards once the vehicle is empty. When the goods and any residue are gone, the placards must come off or be completely covered. Driving around with placards and nothing on board is an offence, and it gives emergency services the wrong information if you’re in a crash.

Signing it off

For managers, the check has a sign-off section at the bottom, so completed sheets can go into your trip records. That gives you a record of what drivers found and fixed, which is useful if a customer or WorkSafe ever asks how you manage dangerous goods transport.