A new study, discussed below, by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety shows that rear truck underride guards are inadequate, and collisions like the one shown above should never have the catastrophic damages that they so often do in the US.
Now there are many reasons that cars hit tractor trailers in the rear, sometimes it is
Knight Transportation was sanctioned by the Federal District Court in Texas for the destruction of evidence, called spoliation in legal circles. This happens frequently in trucking cases after accidents, and is major reason why you should hire a lawyer as soon after a wreck as you can find an experienced tractor trailer lawyer (See my
My article, The New Rules in Trucking Discovery, was published nationally in Trial magazine (February 2011, Volume 47, No. 02). If you are not familiar with the significant regulatory changes that have impacted the trucking industry in late 2010 and early 2011, and thought about how it impacts your cases, you should read it!
In my experience lawyers are needed to handle injury claims for accident victims that involve $5,000 or more in medical bills. Part of the problem is computer systems that use "One Size Fits All" solutions for individual cases. Generally these systems work to lower the recovery paid to the victims of wrecks, which, of course, is why they
Driver distraction, to include cell phone use, is a major cause of wrecks. This is a huge issue in the trucking industry as truck drivers are required to frequently update their company and are on the road weeks at a time, leaving the cell phone their only means of communication with vendors, friends, and family.
Proving
A recent case will have significant impact on truck accident attorneys and lawyers litigating insurance coverage in trucking cases. In Carolina Casualty v. Yeates, 584 F.3d 868 (10th Cir. 2009) (en banc), the court held that the MCS-90 Endorsement applies as surety coverage when the underlying insurance policy to which it is attached provides no coverage
I was speaking to my friend Leigh May in Atlanta, a great products liability lawyer who has handled a number of defective tire cases with major results, and she was kind enough to review my blog on old and defective tires. She made an excellent point that the spare tire is often overlooked when people change
One of the injuries that is of greatest concern for those involved in a truck wreck is a brain injury. While severe brain injuries are easy to identify, mild traumatic brain injuries are not. Explaining the way the brain was injured, and proving to a jury the long term impact of having a brain injury when
Training remains the number one way to prevent truck rollovers according to government and industry officials. A 2007 report by Battelle Memorial Institute for the FMCSA found “75% [of rollovers] are attributed to driver error.” The primary cause was running off the road, caused by driver fatigue or inattentiveness.”
Trucking companies could reduce rollovers by
In a Tractor Trailer rollovers, who is to blame is frequently a major issue. Federal regulations generally require the driver to bear responsibility for the loading, and faulty loading, of the trailer. However an exception is made for loads that are sealed. www.fmcsa.dot.gov/rules-regulations/administration/fmcsr/fmcsrruletext.asp Who then is responsible? Generally speaking it is the company that loaded and