Truck Accidents are on the rise and distracted truck drivers appear to be a reason. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is on a mission to stop drivers who maintain a commercial driver’s license to stop using cell phones while driving a heavy truck or bus. The NTSB endorsed a ban on hand-held and hands-free cell phones after it found that a heavy truck driver caused a wreck that killed ten people in Kentucky while he was distracted by using his cell phone.
Use of the cell phone caused the driver to become distracted (and just for a very short time) and lose control of his 38-ton truck which crossed into oncoming traffic, crashing head- on into a van carrying a family traveling to a wedding. Ten people in the van were killed from the impact as well as the subsequent fire. The truck driver was killed and it was determined that he had been texting and making phone calls throughout that whole day.
Unfortunately, truck and motor vehicle accidents caused by heavy trucks is on the increase resulting in wrongful deaths of 5,000 and serious personal injuries of 100,000 in 2010.
The proposed NTSB ban against distracted driving is important but unenforceable unless adopted by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and all 50 states.
Grazian and Volpe has written extensively on our blog about truck safety and regulation. We hope to help road safety by prosecuting aggressively against the trucking companies and truck drivers who do not follow safe driving practices and/or disregard road and equipment regulations.
Aggressive prosecution is important to our clients and their families and an important catalyst to insure that drivers are properly hired, trained and monitored. Please feel free to contact us by phone if you have any further questions regarding this issue. All of us who share the roads can play a part in making sure they stay safe!
