Operation Austrans phase two ran from November 27 and finished on Saturday.

Police uncovered 18 offences across division five of Victoria Police’s western region, which spans most of central Victoria.

Senior Sergeant Ian Brooks said the offences ranged from work diary faults to, in one or two cases, vehicles that were substantially unroadworthy.

“Overall, I think the general behaviour of the transport industry around the area was pretty good,” he said.

“I was really pleased with the outcome – really positive signs that the transport industry in this part of the world is trying very very hard to make sure their trucks are right and make sure their drivers are right.”

Police also breath-tested more than 200 drivers and carried out 66 roadside drug tests, but found no driver at fault.

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“In fact there wasn’t a positive breath test across the state for truck drivers, which was really pleasing to see,” Senior Sergeant Brooks said.

“Which is just fantastic – it will give the people of central Victoria a little bit of a reassurance that the transport industry around this part of the world are quite conscious of what their responsibilities are, especially the drivers who are zero for everything whilst they’re operating their vehicles.”

Of the trucks that were “grounded”, or taken off the road due to roadworthy issues, Senior Sergeant Brooks said none were from central Victoria.

One, however, was involved in traffic incident on Friday, when smoke was sighted coming from the truck.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s a truck or car, where it’s a serious fault that impacts on safety, they’re removed from the road straight away.”

Senior Sergeant Brooks said unfortunately, since the end of the operation, police had been called to two truck rollovers in central Victoria – one near Bridgewater on Monday and a second near Redesdale on Tuesday.

“Throughout the operation I could almost go as far as to commend our local transport industry on the way they conducted themselves,” he said. 

“It was pleasing to see the majority of the units were in good nick and the drivers were aware of their responsibilities. It was just really really nice to see.”

The operation ran across both Australia and New Zealand and targeted heavy vehicle illegal activities such as drink- and drug-driving, speed, general traffic offences, fatigue, compliance and driver behaviour issues within the road transport industry.