The Causes Of Trucking Accidents
Michael Babboni
Trucking Accidents
There’s no big mystery as to why many car accidents happen. Too often the cause is simply someone looking at their phone for a few seconds too long. There are other common, but tragic causes, such as a driver being drunk, or paying more attention to children in the car than the situation on the road, that are also easily understood. In some ways, trucking accidents can share similar causes, although the final results are always “scaled up” to a higher level of damage and injury.But then there are some types of accidents that are unique to freight hauling trucks. So what are they? We’re going to look at some of the truck-specific accidents that you’ll probably need an auto accident attorney to help with, should you get involved in one.
Exhaustion
While truck drivers may, like automobile drivers, be charged with drunk driving in accidents, a far more common cause of altered states of consciousness for truck drivers is simply being too tired to drive. Unlike the majority of car drivers who are in automobiles to go to one destination, then return, a truck driver is a professional, adhering to a tight schedule to deliver goods to different sites.
This often means punishing schedules and less time for healthy rest and breaks. In some cases, if time is lost in one part of the journey, it has to be made up for in later stages by simply driving longer. Drivers falling asleep at wheel have been known to occur, and when it happens with a truck barreling down a road, the results can be disastrous.
Cargo
The biggest difference between accidents with cars and with trucks is that most of the time, cars are only carrying passengers, or in some cases, a small amount of goods, simply because a car’s carrying capacity isn’t large. Trucks, on the other hand, are specifically engineered to haul huge amounts of freight. This may be in the form of a trailer that holds many crates, or a large tank to carry liquid goods, such as petroleum.
A collision with the trailer can cause the cargo itself to loosen or spill. If it’s “dry goods” such a consumer electronics, or food, the damage to a car can be considerable. If it’s flammable, such as fuel, a spark can cause a conflagration that can devastate everything in the immediate area.
The worst part of cargo related accidents is that it may not even require a collision for the accident to occur. If the trailer is improperly attached to the truck, or the cargo itself is not correctly secured in the trailer, then it’s possible for the cargo itself to spill out or derail from behind the truck, even if no other vehicle has made physical contact. If you’re driving behind a truck when this happens, all you can do is try to avoid the oncoming cargo and hope for the best.
Anyone that finds themselves involved with an accident with a truck should seek legal guidance from an auto accident attorney. This can be a complex case to resolve.