Heavy Truck Accidents and Unneccessary Deaths and Serious Injuries Written by http://www.monheit.com/truck/20041205102621.html
by: Michael Monheit, Esquire of Monheit Law, P.C. Toll Free: 866-761-1385 How common are injuries from heavy truck accidents? An accident involving a heavy truck, 18-wheeler, semi, big tractor-trailer truck, often results in death or serious injury. The statistics are shocking. Over 1 million people were involved in nearly 500,000 large truck related accidents in 1999. That resulted in over 5,000 deaths and over 140,000 injuries. Of those injuries from heavy truck accidents, 10's of thousands involved severe brain damage or loss of limb. Some trucks weigh over 100,000 lbs when fully loaded. Unloaded, they still weigh over 10,000 lbs. That is 5-10 times weight of a car. This problem of heavy truck accidents has been around for years, and data is consistent over time. For example, according to Safety Board analysis of Fatal Accident Reporting System (FARS), in 1993 there were 3,311 heavy trucks involved in 3,169 fatal accidents, in which 3,783 persons died. The FARS report shows that heavy truck accidents are often caused by truckdriver fatigue. In fact, as many as 30 to 40 percent of all heavy truck accidents are caused by fatiuge of driver. What is cost to society of heavy truck accidents? Injuries and fatalities are not only toll inflicted by heavy truck crashes. For example, financial toll that goes along with such crashes impacts commerce, costs of insurance, costs of health care, and costs of good. The NTSB reports that actual cost of all heavy truck accidetns in 1999 was $34 billion. What is most likely cause of heavy truck accidents? The NTSB said, "Because of significant number of heavy truck-related fatalities and significant role of fatigue in such accidents, Board initiated this study of single-vehicle heavy truck accidents to examine role of specific factors, such as drivers' patterns of duty and sleep, in fatigue-related heavy truck accidents and to determine potential remedial actions. The purpose of Board's study was to examine factors that affect driver fatigue and not statistical incidence of fatigue. Therefore, Board specifically selected truck accidents that were likely to include fatigue-related accidents; that is, single-vehicle accidents that tend to occur at night. The Board desired to obtain approximately an equal number of fatigue-related and nonfatigue-related accidents through its notification process." The most common causes of heavy trucks accidents are:
| | Tractor Trailer Truck Driver Fatigue Written by http://www.monheit.com/truck/20041204061023.html
by: Michael Monheit, Esquire of Monheit Law, P.C. Toll Free: 866-761-1385 How current an issue is tractor trailer truck driver fatigue? Truck driver fatigue is a very current issue and has been subject of recent regulatory activity. Truck driver fatigue is subject of new regulations issued by USDOT (U.S. Department of Transportation) through FMCSA branch, which handles motor carrier (trucking) issues . Pursuant to these rules, a tractor trailer truck driver may only drive 11 hours after 10 consecutive hours off. In addition, in order to prevent driver fatiugue, a tractor trailer truck driver may not drive more than 60 hours in any seven day period. If a driver takes 2.5 days off, he can clean his consecutive hours slate and start at 0 again. Why not require even stricter time limits to prevent driver fatigue? Another factor in preventing accidents is driver experience. If stricter guidelines were put in place immediately, there would be an insufficient number of experienced drivers. Thus, while decreasing number of accidents caused by tractor trailer truck driver fatigue, we would see an offset and even increase in total accidents due to those accidents caused by truck driver inexperience. Are all hours logged, or just driving hours? The Truckload Carriers Association has stated that drivers "understate their non-driving hours in their log books" and that to improve sales, companies expect their drivers to "wait, unload, and load at shipper's warehouses at no cost to shipper" and only then, begin logging time for their 11 hours. This may increase actual work hours by 50%, thus significantly increases risk of truck driver fatigue. How common is tractor trailer driver fatiuge in causing accidents? The NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) estimates that truck driver fatigue (lack of sleep, overwork) may be a factor in over a third of all large (semi, 18 wheeler) truck accidents. Further, NTSB found that truck driver fatigue was most likley cause in over 30% of crashes that were fatal to fatigued truck driver.
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