Interpretation Letter 6(09)-001(I) - Color of Flagger's Flag

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U.S. Department of Transportation
Federal Highway Administration

1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE.
Washington, D.C. 20590

March 10, 2010

In Reply Refer To: HOTO-1

Mr. Ernest D. L. Huckaby
MUTCD Consultant Services
13402 Caribou Court
Fort Washington, MD 20744

Dear Mr. Huckaby:

Thank you for your February 22 e-mail message requesting an official interpretation regarding the flag's color in Section 6E.03 of the 2009 Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD).

We became aware that there was a difficulty finding red flags for flagging in emergency situations and we therefore, decided to allow an alternate color of fluorescent orange-red. The intent in Paragraph 9 of Section 6E.03 is to allow either a red or a fluorescent orange-red material to be used for flags. For consistency with other color descriptions in the Manual, we will use a hyphen instead of a slash for this color in future editions of the MUTCD.

Paragraph 11 of Section 6E.03 should say that flags of either color shall be retroreflective when used at night.

For recordkeeping purposes, we have assigned the following official interpretation number and title: "6(09)-001(I) - Color of flagger's flag." Please refer to this number in any future correspondence regarding this topic.

Thank you for your interest in improving the clarity of the provisions contained in the MUTCD. I trust this clarifies the intent of this section of the MUTCD. Please contact Mr. Ken Wood at ken.wood@dot.gov if you have any questions concerning this matter.

Sincerely yours,

Original signed by:

Mark R. Kehrli
Director, Office of Transportation Operations