Truck Injury Lawyer Blog : Truck Accident Lawyer & Attorney: Morgan Adams : Contingency Fee Truck Accident Lawyer

I have previously blogged on the need for seatbelts on buses HERE. When a bus rolls over passengers are often slung out of the bus, resulting in paralysis and death. A simple lap belt. similar to what we use on an airplane, would prevent this.

Recently the highest court in New York looked at whether federal law preempted claims against a bus manufacturer for failing to include passenger seatbelts. The court, in a huge step towards safety, concluded the claim was not preempted by federal law. The case may be found HERE.

Compare the New York decision to an earlier decision in Tennessee HERE.

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This is an issue I feel strongly about. BUSES NEED SEAT BELTS. I have blogged on this before on several different occasions. (Here, here, and here for example).

Monday, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced new buses would be required to have lap-shoulder belts. The article I saw did not reference when the rule would take effect (generally three years from the final published rule), and whether buses would be required to be retrofitted. It did state that most bus fatalities occurred when passengers were thrown from a bus in a rollover, and that seat belts would cut that risk by 77%.

Given that the study showed that 65% of all bus passengers are children and the elderly, isn't it past time we had seat belts on buses? 

The full NHTSA proposed rule can be found here.

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Whenever there is a major bus crash, like the one in reported recently that injured 24 in Atlantic City on June 24th, the passengers (and this case the driver, and the folks in the cars struck by the bus) need good lawyers ASAP. First because there may be limited funds to divide between the injured victims (insurance for buses and tractor trailers has not increased since the 1980's, and what was a lot of money in 1980 sure isn't now, 30 years later. See my blog on the topic here) to pay for their injuries and medical bills. Second, because these cases are never easy, even tough they seem as if they should be.

In this case the issues in the crash will apparently be why the brakes failed and why the driver wasn't aware the brakes were in such poor shape that they were going to fail. The owner of the bus company may not have performed required maintenance or failed to train it's driver to properly inspect the brakes (as is required under the law). The brakes may also have failed from a hidden manufacturing defect, and that issue will have to be carefully scrutinized,  although it is the least likely cause.

Luckily there are some great lawyers in the NJ area who have experience in trying major cases involving commercial motor vehicle accidents. If you have not read my posts on why you need experienced tractor trailer and bus lawyers for your cases stop, and read my posts here, here, and here. I have more posts on the topic, but these are a good start.

Off the top of my head I can think of several New Jersey Lawyers (that also practice in New York if need be) that fit the bill. The good experienced lawyers will be hired quickly (as there are not many who know their way around a major crash like this), and they may not be able to take your case if they are already representing one of the other families. Putting off hiring a lawyer is not something I would tell one of my family members to wait on with a wreck of this magnitude. Consider contacting one of these experienced New Jersey lawyers: 

1. Mike Ferrara
2. Michael Maggiano
3. Larry Simon

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The Western Section of the Tennessee Court of Appeals recently decided that buses in Tennessee are not required to have seat belts. In this case a man was thrown from a bus and received a catastrophic brain injury. The Court of Appeals stated that since the federal government does not mandate seat belts on buses, pursuant to FMVSS 208, the state can not require them. This decision, finding that federal law preempted the issues, was contrary to a 2008 decision in Texas that found seat belts could be required on buses.

It is clear from my prior blogs that I believe seat belts are needed in buses. They. Save. Lives. Many of my clients would be alive, and others able to live a normal life, if they had simply been able to wear a seat belt while on a bus.

Seat belts are on airplanes. If a seat belt will save you after  falling 20,000 feet from the sky, and the cost of the seat belt and the increased fuel costs are more than offset by the increased safety of having them, shouldn't we have seat belts on buses? 

If seat belts on buses don't matter, why are they provided for the bus driver? 

Certainly seat belts should be provided on school buses, but the Court of Appeal's decision would eliminate the states ability to require that. For an article on the need for seat belts on school buses, and the costs, click here. Please see my prior blogs on this topic.

Regardless, unless there is an appeal (and I hope there is), the current law in Tennessee allows bus companies and owners, who know that the lack of seat belts on buses is a horrible problem, to continue escaping liability for the deaths and injuries that occur when buses are ordered without seat belts. 

In the case before the Western Section the jury found that the profoundly brain injured man, who was thrown from the bus due to a lack of seat belts, was entitled to over 8 Million in lost income and other damages. The decision by the Western Section Court of Appeals made it clear that the verdict will never be collected from the bus company, the one company that is directly responsible for purchasing and operating an unsafe bus without seat belts. 

The full opinion can be read here.

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While I have been advocating for seat belts on buses for some time, see my prior blogs, others are happily now joining the fray. Recently Sholnn Freeman , of the Washington Post, wrote an excellent article on the need for seat belts and the increasing dangers of bus travel. Ms. Freeman's article, As Bus Travel Grows, Probe of Fatal Crash Revives Push for New Safety Rules, can be found at: www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/20/AR2009042003716.html 

Much like tractor trailers, buses would be made much safer with seat belts, standards for roof crush, and anti rollover devices such as electronic stability control.

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Once again the failure to have seat belts on school buses has resulted in injuries to our children. In this Nov 12, 2008, wreck involving Whitwell Elementary School students I believe many of the injuries could have been prevented if only there were seat belts on the bus. I have blogged on this topic in the past.

I believe the school board and the government has responsibility for these injuries by allowing a school bus on the roads without seat belts.

Liability will be determined with the help of a DriveCam video the Tennessee Highway Patrol is evaluating. You can see my earlier posts on DriveCam for more about this system. Essentially the system preserves a video clip of a few seconds before the wreck and a few seconds after the wreck.

I would encourage the families with seriously injured children involved in this tragedy to contact a lawyer that can adequately investigate and pursue the various claims and parties involved. Given significant enough injuries potential defendants would include the the drivers (apparently there was a small pickup that may have contributed to the wreck), the bus manufacturer, the operating company (probably Laidlaw as they currently have the DriveCam system installed on the school buses they operate); and the government.

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This is the type of matter my firm handles on a nationwide basis. I hope the families read my posts on how to hire a qualified lawyer for this type of case. It is clear they will need legal help, and someone with experience.

This bus crash, and the fatalities, should never have happened. First there were apparently no seat belts on the bus, a subject I have posted on extensively. Failure to have a seat belt means that passengers will be ejected from the bus, most likely resulting in a fatality. Secondly, the bus had false DOT numbers and other problems that clearly made it a danger. Given the DOT numbers were false we know a few things:

First we know that there is probably no insurance.

Second we know that the Casino is responsible for the wreck under a theory of negligent hiring and/or broker liability. The leading case in this area is Schramm v. Foster, 341 F.Supp.2d 536 (D.Md. 2004) Essentially those that hire folks to drive have a duty to check them out and make sure they can drive safely. Had the casino or broker checked out this bus company it is clear they would have found the sham and never hired this bus and driver. The Casino failed to do so, hired an unsafe, unregistered, and unknown driver because they were cheap. 10 people paid with their lives.

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A Greyhound bus crashed July 10, 2007, injuring or shaking up the 49 people on board.  A passenger with known mental issues grabbed the steering wheel from the bus driver. See: www.wmcstations.com/Global/story.asp

This crash is reprehensible because it was not only easily preventable, but because Greyhound has known for years this type incident occurs without protective barriers for the driver. In fact our firm sued Greyhound over a similar crash in 2001 which resulted in our clients death. The Greyhound bus driver in our case stated that drivers had been asking Greyhound for years for protection from passenger assaults and interference with the the drivers. Greyhound records show that, before the crash my firm handled in 2001, there were 42 similar incidents of passengers interfering with the driving of a bus, with 5 of the incidents resulting in an accident. The experts in our case agreed that an inexpensive protective barrier was called for, readily available, and should be installed on passenger buses.

After significant discovery, effort, and work we were able to prove Greyhound's poor practices and decisions endangered our client and the motoring public. Our clients eventually made a decision to settle their case prior to trial and Greyhound stated they were going to install protective barriers on their buses. Clearly they did not. A companion case to ours, with a paralyzed passenger,  went to trial and received a multimillion dollar verdict which was upheld on appeal.  See: Surles ex rel. Johnson v. Greyhound Lines, Inc., 474 F.3d 288 C.A.6 (Tenn. 2007)

Greyhound should be punished for allowing this type of accident to happen again. They clearly don't understand the need to protect their passengers!

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A tour bus carrying 65 family members crashed at 3AM when the driver fell asleep at the wheel. While everyone onboard was injured, there was one fatality when a 71 year old passenger was ejected from the bus.

The fact that she was ejected from the bus is not surprising, as buses, unlike airplanes, don't have seatbelts. The issue centers around a concept known as "compartmentalization." Buses that weigh more than 10,000 pounds are built to offer "passive restraint" to riders: closely-spaced seats that protect passengers in the same way an egg carton protects its contents. Our firms experience in bus crashes shows compartmentalization doesn't offer adequate protection in side impacts or rollovers, where passengers don't get thrown forwards, but are ejected through the bus windows or thrown against the floor or ceiling. In fact seatbelts would help retain passengers in the "compartment", making buses even safer. Experts estimate seatbelts would cost about $1,000, or $15.15 a passenger for a 66 passenger bus. This works out to less than a nickle a day per passenger in the first year, far less than this over the life of a bus. In short it makes no sense not to have seatbelts on buses.  

Many states now require school buses to have seatbelts. Early this month Texas enacted a law which would require  all buses purchased on or after Sept. 1, 2010, to have seatbelts. While that doesn't help folks today, it is a step in the right direction for Texas. If the bus you or your children are on are on does not have seatbelts what do you do?
 

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