Here is a one-question quiz you must pass. Your life might depend upon it. What is the most dangerous maneuver you make while driving a tractor or sprayer on the road?

“It’s often a left-hand turn off the road you’re driving on into a field or driveway,” says Fred Whitford, director of Purdue University Pesticide Programs. “When you’ve got cars behind you, drivers can get confused and not realize what you intend to do. If someone thinks you’re slowing down to let them pass instead of turn, they might try to pass. That’s when an accident can happen.”

Upgrade lights
How do you make it safer to turn left? There are no guarantees. “You can’t control ‘stupid,’” Whitford says. “You don’t know if the person behind you is distracted, and you don’t know what they’re thinking. You also don’t know if they have experience dealing with slow-moving equipment. Yet you can take steps to increase the chances that drivers behind you will understand what you intend to do. That decreases the odds for an accident.”

The first step is upgrading to LED lights, such as on the back of your sprayer, Whitford notes. He has demonstrated to audiences that LED lights are much brighter and easier for a following motorist to see than traditional lightbulbs.

“What I really prefer is an LED left-turn arrow,” he says. “They show up very well on the back of a sprayer and make your intentions clear. It’s worth the minimal expense and time it takes to install it.”

Even though you have flashing lights, even if they’re LED lights with a left-turn arrow, you still need a clean slow-moving vehicle emblem, Whitford says. It’s required by law for the backs of slow-moving vehicles.  

Own the road
Once you’re on the road, the biggest thing you can do is put yourself in position to take command of the road, especially as you approach where you’ll make a left-hand turn, Whitford says.

“I call it ‘owning the road,’” he explains. “Work yourself into the middle of the road well in advance of the turn.  That tells drivers that you’re in command of the road, and they should not pass. From the middle of the road, it’s safer to turn left without someone thinking it’s OK to pass you on the left.”

If someone is dumb enough to try to pass on the right and winds up in the ditch, there’s nothing you can do about that one, he adds. Your concern is that they don’t try to pass on the left and run into you as you turn.

“The other thing you can do is shut off all your lights just for a moment before you reach the turn,” Whitford says. “Flashing lights tend to put people in a trance. Then turn on your left-turn signal to get the driver’s attention. If you shut them off, then back on, it’s something different, and most people will become alert. It’s rewarding to find that a number of farmers in audiences I talk to are using this simple technique.”