Truck AccidentsUnderride Truck Accident Lawyer

Underride truck accidents often resulted in the death of car drivers until rear underride guards were mandated. Side underride accidents continue to result in many deaths. Semi Trucks are required to have rear underride guards. The rear underride guard is the metal that extends from the rear of the trailer down the height of a passenger car’s bumper. This is a relatively inexpensive safety feature that was tragically brought into law after Jayne Mansfield, a blonde Hollywood bombshell was killed. She was a passenger in a car that slid under the rear of a semi truck. She was killed instantly along with the other adults in the car. Her young children, including Mariska Hargitay, the star of Law and Order SVU survived with minor injuries. She still has a scar on her face from this truck crash. This tragic loss of life resulted in legislation mandating the use of rear underride guards. It is a tragedy that side-underride guards are not currently required. Advocates for trucking safety lament that it took the death of Hollywood star in 1967 led to the 1998 rear underride guard mandate. The side underride guards are relatively inexpensive to install and efforts to require their use are currently being opposed by the trucking industry. The underride truck accident lawyer at Patterson Law is available to discuss your case.

The most common underride accidents involve cars running into the back of slow-moving tractor trailers, tractor trailers that stopped on the side of the road and tractor trailers that are pulling onto a roadway. Tractor trailers are very large and usually visible but at night visibility is often limited to lighting, reflective striping and warning devices such as cones or triangles.  U-turns made by tractor trailers at night are incredibly dangerous to cars traveling on the roadway.  

Driver reaction and perception is a science that explains why these crashes occur. The total stopping time for a driver faced with a hazard is the total of:

• The time to perceive/recognize the hazard
• The time that involved in the decision process as to the proper reaction
• The time it takes to apply the brakes, plus
• The time and distance for the vehicle to stop.

Due to the specific lighting conditions and surrounding conditions at the time of an underride crash the time it takes for a driver to recognize and perceive a hazard may be difficult to estimate. This portion of a driver’s reaction time involves detecting a light or a reflection and they are identifying that light or reflection as something that requires evasive actions such as braking.

Imagine a tractor with a long flat bed stopped on the side of a large highway at night. The driver decides to make a U-Turn traveling across multiple lanes of traffic. The tractor’s headlights are shining away from approaching traffic and the large flatbed trailer is at a significant angle during most of the U-turn. The reflective white and red safety is reflecting the light from approaching cars to the side of the road until the trailer is perpendicular to approaching traffic. An approaching car sees a couple of small lights that appear to be floating in the roadway, yet the flatbed trailer is so high that the taillights of a car a couple hundred yards ahead are still visible. The approaching motorist interprets this data as indicating that the next vehicle in his travel lane is a couple of hundred yards away and traveling at speed. As the motorist nears the truck the trailer becomes perpendicular. Now the motorist’s headlights hit the reflective striping and the light shines directly back to the driver. The driver is now too close to stop and the trailer is blocking all lanes of travel. The driver slams on his brakes crashing into the trailer. The top of the car is nearly sheared off by the impact.

An accident reconstruction team arrives at daylight. Photographs are taken showing an enormous truck across a flat wide roadway with no obstructions. The police conclude that driver inattention on the part of the car driver was the cause of the crash. Cases like this often require the retention of accident reconstructionists with conspicuity experts. A conspicuity expert can assess what a driver under the same circumstances on the night of the accident observed.

A common underride case occurs where a vehicle strikes a stopped truck on or near the roadway. This often results in a passenger becoming wedged under the rear bumper of the truck. The federal motor carrier safety regulations recognize that stopped trucks on the highway or should pose a danger to the driving public. The regulations applicable to motor carriers and commercial truck drivers are designed to minimize and hopefully present these crashes. The underride truck accident lawyer at Patterson Law is familiar with the applicable mandates for underrides, industry standards and the regulations designed to prevent underride truck accidents from occurring. A commercial truck driver is supposed to take the following steps when parking on a highway or shoulder:

• Immediately activate the trucks flashers, except during the day.
• As soon as possible but within 10 minutes place one traffic warning device (flare or fluorescent triangle) on the side of the traffic approximately 10 feet from the rear of the truck.
• Then place a second traffic warning device about 100 feet from the rear of the truck in the center of the shoulder or travel lane where the truck is stopped.
• A third warning device is to be placed away from traffic.
• If the truck stopped where there are hills or other obstructions the safety devices are required to be placed further back to alert unsuspecting traffic.
• Likewise, if a truck is stopped on the travel portion of a divided or one-way road the last of the three traffic warning devices needs to be placed 200 feet from the rear of the truck.

A careful analysis of the location of the stopped truck and local laws is required to determine if the stopping of the truck at the location was safe or legally permitted. The weather conditions at the time the truck was stopped must also be analyzed. A truck, if possible, should not stop on a shoulder of a highway when there is icy conditions or heavy fog.

Underride crashes produce devastating injuries and often fatalities. The people involved in these accidents are often unable to timely seek legal help. It is incumbent on their family members and loved ones to reach out to an underride truck accident lawyer before critical evidence has been lost or destroyed.