Abu Dhabi: A new system will soon help police detect whether faulty tyres are responsible for a road accident.
It is part of a new regulation stipulating stringent standards for tyres which is expected to come into force by the end of September this year.
Aiming to achieve zero accidents due to faulty tyres, it will put in place a system to track all tyres being sold in the country.
Technical specifications have recently been developed for several products and tyres are the most important product as faulty ones can result in fatal accidents, a senior official told Gulf News Monday.
The seller should have a certificate of origin for tyres which will be identified by a bar code, Mohammad Saleh Badri, Acting Director General of Emirates Authority for Standardisation and Metrology (ESMA), said.
Each and every tyre will be registered with the ESMA system which can be accessed by other authorities such as police, traffic departments, civil defence departments, etc, he said. "We will also share the database with other GCC nations," the official said. The reported malpractice of using somebody else's tyres to pass a vehicle fitness test will be stopped as the authority can easily track the tyre with the bar code, Badri said.
"The system will track a tyre from its origin until its destruction so we call the certificate of origin a birth certificate ," he explained.
Nobody can sell a tyre in the country without a certificate of origin; ESMA will conduct inspections at tyre shops and warehouses with the help of police, Badri said.
Detection
In the event of an accident, police can easily track the life cycle of the tyres of the vehicles involved in the crash by using the ESMA system [to detect whether they were faulty or worn out], the official said.
The existing regulations are not applicable to motorbikes and heavy machines, but the new regulation will cover the tyres of all motor vehicles in the country, he said.
"Although we don't have the statistics, the police say that faulty tyres cause many accidents," Badri said.
Gulf News reported on June 15 an accident in which about 19 people were injured in an incident involving a school bus and a minibus. The incident was caused when the minibus' tyre burst on Shaikh Zayed Road. About 35 schoolchildren had a providential escape in the mishap.
ESMA is making the specifications in cooperation with other authorities concerned such as the Ministry of Interior, police departments, and the private sector, Badri said.
The authority has also formed a technical working group of the leading importers and manufacturers of tyres in the UAE. The technical regulation will also cover conditions for manufacturing, handling, storage, re-treating, maintenance and disposal of tyres as per GCC standards. The regulation will come into force after the approval of the board of directors of ESMA and the UAE cabinet.
Eliminating fakes
The system will also help eliminate fake tyres from the market, Mohammad Saleh Badri said. Customers can check the authenticity of the tyres by using the bar code number on the Emirates Authority for Standardisation and Metrology website. An iPhone can be used to scan the bar code and put it on the website to check the tyre.
Motorists should check the date of manufacture, temperature, tyre load, exact size and speed symbol before purchasing a new tyre.
