You need DD Form 651, and this page gives you the blank plus the steps for handling it. Start with what the form does: Carrier's Report of Vehicle Damage or Breakdown. Its official title is DD Form 651, Carrier's Report of Vehicle Damage or Breakdown, August 1969.
Next, check the edition. You want not stated, currently carried as not stated by the publisher. Then confirm the form applies to you — this is a Department of Defense form, so you use it whether you serve in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Space Force or Coast Guard under Defense jurisdiction.
Once you know the form fits, find out when you file it. not stated sets the requirement, and not stated maintains the form itself. Your own command or agency adds local timing on top of that, so ask your administrative office if the deadline matters to you.
Finally, decide how you will complete it. You can type into a fillable file or print a blank and write by hand, and the rest of this page walks you through both paths in order.
Start at the header. Complete your identification before anything else, then work through the main entries, then finish at the certification. Skipping around causes contradictions between the top of the form and the bottom.
Your first action is verification. Find the edition date on the form and match it against not stated. A mismatch means you are working from a superseded printing, and because DD forms change Department-wide rather than service by service, the office receiving it will notice.
If a particular field puzzles you, read the instructions printed on the form first, then go to not stated. When the two disagree, follow the directive.
Download the form
First, look at what you can download. The set covers PDF, the form runs 5 pages, and you will complete roughly 25 fields.
Take the pdf if you are unsure. Then check which kind you have: if the boxes highlight when you click them, you have a fillable pdf and can type straight into it, and your entries save with the file. If nothing highlights, you have a printable pdf — send it to a printer and use black ink.
Type when you can. Printed entries stay legible after the form is scanned, copied and forwarded, and handwriting often does not survive that trip. If you must write by hand, use block capitals and press firmly.
Handle xfdl in two steps. First confirm you have IBM Lotus Forms Viewer or a compatible reader on your machine; ordinary pdf software will report the file as broken. Once the viewer is running, download and fill the form.
All of it downloads free. When you are ready to work, do this: save the file locally, then open it in a full pdf application. Browsers often ignore field properties, and you can lose everything you typed.
What the form asks for
- 1.a. Type and make of vehicle.
- b. Vehicle registration number.
- 2.a. Bill of lading number.
- b. Freight bill number.
- 3. Location of accident or vehicle breakdown.
- 4. Speedometer reading at time of accident or vehicle breakdown.
- 5. Date and time of accident or vehicle breakdown.
- 6. Date and time vehicle returned to operation.
- 7. Describe damage(s) and/or trouble (if additional space is required, explain in Remarks).
- 8. Cost of repairs: Material.
- Labor cost.
- Approval of repair costs in excess of those authorized must be obtained from: Shipping transportation office.
- Address (include zip code).
- Telephone number.
- 9. Remarks.
- 10.a. Signature of operator.
- b. Name of carrier.
- 11.a. Signature of operator.
- b. Name of carrier.
- 12. Signature of receiving officer.
- Total cost of repairs.
- Press this Reset button to clear the data from all fields.
With the form finished, route it to the office named in not stated or in your organization's own instruction. Keep a copy first. People rarely regret having one and frequently regret not having one.
If the form points you to another document, you can find it by number alone. DD numbering runs across the whole Department, so you do not need to work out which service issued it — one number, one form, everywhere.
Here is where people go wrong. They see a number in an instruction and download whichever form matches it. But DA and DD are separate systems — Army-specific in one case, Department-wide under not stated in the other — so check which series you were sent to before you take the file.
Come back and check the edition next time you need this form. Editions change when the prescribing directive is reissued, when the information collected changes, or when the required notice language is updated, and none of those events reaches you directly. Verifying not stated at the moment you download is the whole defence.
Before you go, note what is not covered here. You have the blank form and instructions for completing it; you do not have legal guidance, and no statement on this page determines what any office will do with your submission. Direct those questions to not stated, to the personnel office that serves you, or to the office designated in not stated.
Questions and answers
- What is DD Form 651?
- DD Form 651, Carrier's Report of Vehicle Damage or Breakdown, August 1969
- Which edition is current?
- Not stated by the publisher
- Who is responsible for this form?
- Not stated
- In which formats can it be downloaded?