Crash course

HOPKINTON -- Frederick D. Rose III, a trucking company safety supervisor, looks happy as he watches a large white truck screech through a puddle of water, spin around several times, and jolt to a stop facing the wrong way.

''I've always wanted to spin out a truck," he said.

At Liberty Mutual, he can. The supervisor at Watkins Motor Lines Inc., who works in Charlotte, N.C., joined a dozen other trucking industry veterans in Hopkinton last week to learn all manner of commercial truck safety, from how to properly stop without antilock brakes to the best way to get in an out of the truck. The students in a Liberty Mutual class each take their turn steering the big rigs around the track, skidding through water, and practicing what it feels like to drive a truck out of control.

''You have to understand that at certain speeds, you simply cannot control the vehicle," said David F. Melton, director of transportation consulting for Liberty's Research Institute for Safety.

Most of the trucking executives have never driven like that before. The goal: If they ever find themselves in a real emergency, Liberty wants them to be able to react well to it. They also train others in their companies to use the techniques.

The idea of offering hands-on courses in truck driver safety makes financial sense for Liberty Mutual Group, a large Boston insurer that writes both auto insurance and workers' compensation policies for commercial customers. Though Liberty offers the course to its customers for no additional cost, it hopes the training will cut down on the number of accidents for companies, and ultimately save the insurer money.

Corporate customers do not get a discount on their insurance if they take the course, but they would cut insurance costs over time if they reduced the number of accidents in the fleets. Liberty uses its course in Hopkinton to train safety supervisors and other driver trainers, not the drivers themselves.

Liberty now plans to use the knowledge gained from its driver training course to train companies in China, where Liberty plans to enter the insurance market in the next several weeks. The insurer plans to bring employees from its China operations to the track in Hopkinton, then have them use their skills to train Chinese drivers.

During the courses, which vary in length from one day to a week, the drivers practice several different skills. Large trucks cannot stop as fast as a car, and cannot swerve as fast as a car, Liberty executives said. That makes them harder to control. Most newer trucks have antilock brakes, but the older ones do not, so drivers must practice on both.

Still, the trucking managers approached the task with a fair amount of bravado.

''Don't worry about this. I'm a professional," one driver said before accelerating to 30 miles per hour and sending the truck into a rapid 360-degree spin.

The next time around the track, the driver practiced steering his way out of a skid, by correcting the course as soon as the truck started to skid one way, then turning the wheel again when the truck tried to skid the other way.

Liberty executives said the classes attract a range of companies, from plain vanilla trucking firms to large corporate customers that handle a large number of deliveries.

In the classroom, Liberty executives emphasize the need to hire the right truck drivers from the outset, rather than hiring bad drivers and hoping to retrain them to be better. They also talk about ways that companies can reduce the number of injuries in their workforce, and cut workers' compensation claims.

For example, Liberty executives said, some truck drivers jump out of the truck, while others try to step out of the truck as if they are exiting a car. That can cause injuries. The proper way is pretend to be climbing down a ladder, Liberty said.

Companies also should watch for ways to minimize the loads that their truck drivers must lift, or use mechanical aids to help them, Liberty tells trucking students.

Liberty executives said their trucking classes are unusual for an insurance company, but they are convinced that they are a good investment.

''Does what we do here make a difference? Unquestionably," Melton said.

Sasha Talcott can be reached at stalcott@globe.com.