HARTFORD, Conn. -- The results of an insurance audit completed at the Connecticut Department of Motor Vehicles are surprising, officials said Friday.

The state is paying closer attention to how much insurance trucking companies have, officials said, because a company whose truck was involved in a fatal crash three years ago had very little.

The audit says “approximately 90 percent of the estimated 6,000 commercial carriers hadn’t filed evidence of insurance coverage for the six-month period beginning January 2007.”

"That's a tremendous number,” said auditor Robert Jaekle. “It's staggering. And the potential is certainly very serious.”

Jaekle said his agency's report also found that when the DMV tries to detect uninsured passenger vehicles, “between 40,000 and 90,000 vehicles typically can’t be matched to an insurance-company record.”

The DMV and state auditors said they agree that doesn't mean all of those cars and trucks lack insurance coverage.

But the DMV still said it’s “looking to improve the situation that exists.”

That includes setting up a real-time computer database to track trucking-company insurance, DMV officials said. Doing that for all of the passenger vehicles in real time could be difficult, if not impossible, officials said.