10/5/12
Non-economic damage (pain, suffering, scarring, disfigurement) caps in Kansas upheld in Supreme Court's decision in Miller v. Johnson
Plaintiffs in Kansas personal injury cases won a huge victory today when the Kansas Supreme Court ruled that the $250,000 damage cap imposed under K.S.A. 60-19a02 was unconstitutional. Kansas serious injury lawyers believed that the limit violated their client's jury trial rights and left seriously injured plaintiffs unable to make a complete recovery.
Non-economic damages include pain, suffering, disfigurement, scarring, and inconveinence, among others. What the cap meant was that, if a Kansas resident was paralyzed or severely burned due to another's negligence, they could only collect their economic damages (medical expenses, lost wages, etc.) and $250,000. That is right, the damage caps essentially valued the pain and suffering of horrific burns at $250,000.
The Kansas Supreme Court upheld the cap in a 1990 decision, and law supporters contend in legal filings that imposing such limits is a policy decision that should be left to the Legislature. They also noted that legislators imposed the limits to keep liability insurance affordable and make the legal system more predictable.
According to the American Medical Association, more than half of U.S. states limit non-economic damages. But in July, the Missouri Supreme Court struck down that state's $350,000 limit on non-economic damages in medical malpractice lawsuits.9/4/12
71 Highway in Missouri to be changed to Interstate 49
Change should mean more truck traffic ans safer travel on the highway
Driving from Kansas City to Joplin, Mo., down U.S. Highway 71 is going to get much faster.
The Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission on Wednesday approved a plan to upgrade the corridor to interstate standards by the end of 2012.
The $65 million project will involve replacing 12 at-grade crossings along the route with overpasses or interchanges. Once completed, the route would be renamed Interstate 49.
“Improving U.S. 71 between I-435 in Kansas City and I-44 near Joplin enhances economic development opportunities and freight movement,” Kevin Keith, interim commission director, said in a release. “We are excited about getting closer to an I-49 designation in Missouri.”
The money originally was planned to help build an interstate bypass of Bella Vista, Ark., between Joplin and Fort Smith, Ark. But financing problems in Arkansas had delayed that project.
Any money left over from upgrading U.S. 71 will go toward the Bella Vista bypass, the commission said.
9/3/12
Kansas police officers to begin seeking warrants for blood draws when drivers refuse breath tests
Salina police and Saline County sheriff’s deputies are planning to try a new process of “no refusal” saturation patrol Friday as they seek impaired drivers.
Lt. Russ Lamer said if a police officer has probable cause to pull a driver over on suspicion of driving under the influence and the driver refuses a breath or blood test, the officer will pursue a search warrant to collect a sample of the driver’s blood.
Lamer said four additional officers and one additional supervisor will be on patrol from 11:30 p.m. Friday to 2:30 a.m. Saturday. The Saline County Sheriff’s Office also will have additional deputies on patrol, he said.
He said the goal is to put the new procedure in place in the future whenever a DUI test is refused. Lamer said that as of July 1 a driver who meets certain criteria, such as a previous DUI conviction or a previous refusal of a DUI test, can be charged for refusing a breath or blood test
He said an affidavit will be emailed to a representative of the county attorney’s office and a judge, who will be able to apply an electronic signature to a warrant. Lamer said he expects the new process to take about 30 minutes, shaving about an hour and a half off the process and allowing officers to obtain a blood sample before alcohol has dispersed through a person’s system.
8/10/12
18-wheeler carrying crane nealy kills motorcyclist when it hits a low bridge
The heavy truck severly damaged a bridge which then injured a motorcylcle rider
7/25/12
Kansas City, Missouri releases injury accident/crash data for 2011 & 2012 (to date)
7/12/12
Medical care expenses in personal injury cases rising due to "in-house" pharmacies in treating doctor's offices
Those injured in automobile or heavy truck collisions can see hospital/doctor's bills go up dramatically when filling prescriptions at the doctor's office
The story below appeared in the New York Times and covers the high cost of prescrption drugs when filled in doctor's office pharmacies, noting that in some instances the medication costs almost 10 times the price of a regular pharmacy.
Personal injury attorneys and our clients understand that health care costs, in general, are completely out of control. My Kansas City 18-wheeler injury accident law firm regularly sees clients whose hospital bills, future surgery, and future rehabilitation expenses stretch into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Consequently, seeing a story like this really hurts because I understand that, at the end of the day, this will only take money out of my client's pockets.
When a pharmacy sells the heartburn drug Zantac, each pill costs about 35 cents. But doctors dispensing it to patients in their offices have charged nearly 10 times that price, or $3.25 a pill.
The same goes for a popular muscle relaxant known as Soma, insurers say. From a pharmacy, the per-pill price is 60 cents. Sold by a doctor, it can cost more than five times that, or $3.33.
At a time of soaring health care bills, experts say that doctors, middlemen and drug distributors are adding hundreds of millions of dollars annually to the costs borne by taxpayers, insurance companies and employers through the practice of physician dispensing....Doctors can make tens of thousands of dollars a year operating their own in-office pharmacies. The practice has become so profitable that private equity firms are buying stakes in the businesses, and political lobbying over the issue is fierce.
I have said it before, but it bears repeating - this country's rising health care costs are due to for-profit medicine, not due to the personal injury industry. Large truck injury lawyers simply help thier clients get the compensation they deserve for the injuries they had no fault in.
In Florida, a company called Automated HealthCare Solutions, a leader in physician dispensing, has defeated repeated efforts to change what doctors can charge. The company, which is partly owned by Abry Partners, a private equity firm, has given more than $3.3 million in political contributions either directly or through entities its principals control, public records show...Physician prescribing works like this: Middlemen like Automated HealthCare help doctors set up office pharmacies by providing them with billing software and connecting them with suppliers who repackage medications for office sale. Doctors sell the drugs but they do not collect payments from insurers. In the case of Automated HealthCare, the company pays the doctor 70 percent of what the doctor charges, then seeks to collect the full amount from insurers.
As the article indicates, it appears that the organization behind these billing schemes is far from a simple doctor saying "I wanted to provide easier access to my patients." This is a scheme to milk more money out of the health care industry, at the expense of those who need health care the most.
The loophole that raises the price of physician-dispensed drugs often involves a benchmark called average wholesale price. The cost of a medication dispensed through a workers compensation plan is pegged in some states to that benchmark, which is supposed to represent a drugs typical wholesale cost.
But doctor-dispensed drugs can undergo an average wholesale price makeover. It happens when firms that supply doctors with medications buy them in bulk from wholesalers and repackage them for office sale. These repackagers can set a new average wholesale price, one that is often many times higher than the original.
For example, in 2010, a physician associated with the Spine Center, Dr. Loevs practice in Maryland, gave a patient a prescription for 360 patches containing a pain-numbing drug, lidocaine. The workers insurer was charged $7,304, according to a copy of that bill provided to The New York Times by a lawyer, Michael S. Levin, who represents insurance companies.
It appears that insurance companies are now learning of these schemes and taking steps to stop them. Kansas and Missouri personal injury attorneys and insurance companies rarely get along, but in this instance, I welcome the lobbying power of insurance companies because lowering health care costs will always help my clients.
6/28/12
Big-Rig involved in 20-car highway crash
Heavy truck crash left at least 17 injured, with two injured critically
On Tuesday, a big-rig truck and nearly 20 cars collided Tuesday on a freeway in the mountains north of Los Angeles, resulting in at least 17 people sent to hospitals, including two with critical injuries.
Television news photos and videos showed numerous cars, trucks & SUVs mangled together and piled on top of each other in a mass of twisted steel.
The crash was reported at 9:45 a.m., and Los Angeles County fire Capt. Mark Savage said "there are 19 vehicles involved, at least one or two big-rigs." Firefighters freed a person trapped in the wreckage, and a fleet of ambulances ferried the injured to hospitals, Savage said. Fire Capt. Doug LaCount told KABC-TV that most of the injuries were minor.
All the southbound lanes and two northbound lanes were reopened at 2:08 p.m., according to the California Highway Patrol. The cause of the large truck accident was under investigation.
Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/06/26/3677178/truck-nearly-20-cars-crash-on.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy
Courtesy of the Associate Press
6/5/12
Crash test video shows the impact of an 18-wheeler on a passenger vehicle
Video shows how quickly those rear-ended by large truck can be killed or injured
6/1/12
State-by-State information on citation and civil assessments issued for heavy truck (18-wheelers, semi-trailers, tractor-trailers) overweight violations
Overweight trucks are hazards to other motorists because they can cause the truck driver to lose control and cause serious or fatal highway accidents
Kansas & Missouri 18-wheeler/tractor-trailer injury attorneys understand the hazards overweight trucks such as dump trucks, 18-wheelers, and semis pose to motorists sharing the road with them. Large trucks are designed to carry a certain load and if that load is exceeded, they can have trouble steering or braking in time to avoid a collision with other motorists.
If a large truck (semi-truck/18-wheeler/dump truck/tractor-trailer) collides with a normal passenger vehicle, the results are rarely less than serious injuries for the occupants of the passenger vehicle. Large trucks simply outweigh passenger vehicles with a normal load, a fact that is emphasized when heavy trucks are overweight.
To prevent truck drivers from overloading their vehicles, states impose civil and even criminal penalties on drivers of overweight trucks. This is especially true if an overweight truck is involved in a highway collision resulting in serious injuries or deaths. Truck crash lawyers in Missouri and Kansas understand that investigating the court cases of a truck driver can dramatically help an injured client recover the compensation they deserve after being a victim of an overweight truck.
Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) policy is that each State enforce vehicle size and weight laws to assure that violations are discouraged and that vehicles traversing the highway system do not exceed the limits specified by law. These size and weight limits are based upon design specifications and safety considerations, and enforcement shall be developed and maintained both to prevent premature deterioration of the highway pavement and structures and to provide a safe driving environment (23 CFR 657.5).
Each State shall certify to the Federal Highway Administrator, before January 1 of each year, that it is enforcing all State laws respecting maximum vehicle size and weight permitted on what, prior to October 1, 1991, were the Federal-aid Primary, Secondary, and Urban Systems, including the Interstate System, in accordance with 23 U.S.C. 127. The States must also certify that they are enforcing and complying with the ISTEA freeze on the use of Longer Combination Vehicle's (LCV's) and other multi-unit vehicles. The certification shall be supported by information on activities and results achieved during the preceding 12-month period ending on September 30 of each year (23 CFR 657.13).
In their certification to FHWA the States submit measures of activity, including penalties. Penalties reported include the number of citations or civil assessments issued for violations of each of the following: Axle, gross and bridge formula weight limits. The number of vehicles whose loads are either shifted or offloaded must also be reported (23 CFR 657.15(f)(3)(ii)).
The following are the Federally mandated maximum weights for the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways and reasonable access thereto:
1) 80,000 pounds gross vehicle weight
2) 20,000 pound single axle weight*
3) 34,000 pound tandem axle weight**
4) Bridge Formula***
*Single axle weight: Total weight transmitted to the road by all wheels whose centers may be included between two parallel transverse vertical planes 40 inches apart, extending across the full width of the vehicle.
**Tandem axle weight: Total weight transmitted to the road by two or more consecutive axles whose centers may be included between parallel transverse vertical planes spaced more than 40 inches and not more than 96 inches apart, extending across the full width of the vehicle.
***Federal bridge formula: Focuses on cargo placement and effects on axle loading. It applies when the gross weight on two or more consecutive axles exceeds the limitations of the formula. The bridge formula may reduce otherwise legal gross vehicle weight (For more information on the Federal Bridge Formula see 23 CFR 658.17(e) or the FHWA Publication Bridge Formula Weights.
If you're looking for a 18-wheeler accident attorney, call Jeremiah Johnson at 913-764-5010!
5/21/12
Federal Highway Administration study shows that highways are critical to moving goods and a healthy economy
The Federal Highway Administration released freight data for 2010 pinpointing key traffic chokepoints on some of the nation's busiest roads that will help transportation planners, operators and private shippers and carriers better target their investments and plan their delivery routes.
"It is more important than ever to make sure we spend hard earned taxpayer dollars on projects that will create good jobs and help businesses save money," said U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. "This information will help local governments and business owners make sound decisions on where investments should be made."
The data show congestion increased at 61 percent of the 100 identified freight bottlenecks from 2009 to 2010. The data unveiled today builds on an initiative to capture information on truck travel speeds at 100 locations around the country, gathered from GPS and satellite technology in commercial trucks that measures how fast trucks travel at any given place and point in time on key freight routes. FHWA has now expanded this to 250 locations.
"Our highways are critical to commerce and a healthy economy," said Federal Highway Administrator Victor Mendez. "Accurate and comprehensive information on freight movement will allow government agencies and the private sector to make smart, data-driven transportation decisions."
State and local transportation agencies can use the information to help prioritize highway investments to target critical congestion needs. Businesses and freight companies can use it to more strategically time and choose their routes to avoid congested areas when possible.
Developed through a multi-year FHWA research initiative with the American Transportation Research Institute, this study represents a first of its kind effort to capture information exclusively based on truck travel speeds from around the country through on board GPS and satellite technology.
Additional information on each of the 250 locations and a map showing the year over year changes at the initial 100 locations are available.
5/20/12
Truck takes turn to fast, loses control and rolls over
18-wheeler almost killed the drivers and passengers in two vehicles
The drivers of the two cars who narrowly escaped death can thank their lucky stars that the truck driver in the video below did not crush them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=7dypVgSEQ_Y
5/16/12
NHTSA preliminary reports indicate that traffic fatalities are the lowest in recorded history
Causes for the drop in deaths is likely due to safer vehicles
A good Kansas City auto accident injury attorney will not be surprised at the most recent NHTSA study showing a drop in auto accident fatalities.
Crashes that were deadly only a decade ago are now survivable due to advances in safety technologies such as air bags, stability control systems, crumple zones, and seat belts. Similalry, auto accidents in the Kansas City area that resulted in severe injuries a decade ago now result in people walking away with relatively minor injuries.
At the Law Offices of Jeremiah Johnson, LLC, we understand that safer vehicles matter when it comes to survivability and the severity of injuries in an auto accident in Kansas City.
A NHTSA report released last week stated that there were only 1.09 traffic fatalities per 100 million miles driven in America last year, the lowest number since the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) started keeping records in 1949. The reason? Despite government fear-mongering, we now have safer cars and fewer drunk and high drivers.
Despite fear-mongering from the government that we're all going to be killed in a fiery crash because kids have cell phones in their cars, people are actually dying a lot less in car accidents. The preliminary number from NHTSA shows 32,310 died in car crashes last year, a 1.7 decrease over 2010. The number of car fatalities has decreased every year since 2005 when it hit 42,708.
NHTSA will announce their full statistics and explanations for the improvement later this year, but factors contributing to the decline include a decrease in alcohol-related and drug-related fatalities, 3% and 17%, respectively. The greatest drop in road deaths was in New England, which saw a 7.2% decrease year-over-year.
Perhaps more people are taking transit because of the economy? States lacking robust mass-transit infrastructure like California, Arizona, and Hawaii saw a combined 3.3% increase in traffic deaths.
Our theory for the decrease in auto accident fatalities? People switching from terrible handling SUV rhinoceroses to slightly more maneuverable CUV vehicles.
4/24/12
Semi-Trailer overturns, spilling sulfuric acid on road
Acid from the 18-wheeler crash caused numerous injuries
A flatbed truck carrying 1,000 gallons of sulfuric acid has spilled onto a Bartow highway, forcing the closure a busy stretch of highway Tuesday morning.
According to Polk County spokesman Brad Ruhman, for some reason the truck driver performed a hard stop just before 6 a.m., causing the truck to overturn, spilling several containers of acid onto State Road 60 near Rifle Range Road.
Officials said the driver was burned by the acid. He sustained second-degree burns on his extremities, officials said. He was airlifted to a local hospital.
Both State Road 60 and Rifle Range Road are closed in all directions near the spill site. A hazardous materials team was called to the scene.
Officials have not said how long the roadways would be closed.
The spill inconvenienced drivers and affected nearby businesses.
Camping World just down the road had no customers. It had to stay shut down on a day when it should have had a crowd for a grand reopening.
"And with the advertising we spent and the traffic we have seen over the last few days it's hard to estimate how much we have lost, said Joe Shirey, Camping World.
At the nearby Rockin' W Ranch, workers loaded up 18 horses in trailers and moved them to other locations as a precaution.
"About three or four tailors full, said Wyatt Wheeler. And we are pulling hay and grain in the whole bit so if we can't get back here or shouldn't come back here we've got supplies to last us."
Wheeler believes his mom was affected by fumes.
"When she got out here it was really irritating her throat, he said. She started coughing, the whole bit."
Traffic Expert Chuck Henson is advising drivers to use 80 Foot Road to Cox Road to Alturas Road as an alternate to State Road 60. Rifle Range Road drivers are advised to use Bomber Road to US 17 to avoid the closure.
Acid spill concerns
The flatbed truck that crashed also was carrying salt pellets, which are used in water filtration.
When those pellets mix with sulfuric acid, it results in hydrogen chloride gas. According to Priority Health's Dr. Randy Shuck, the hazardous materials spilled in the crash can cause coughing, choking, inflammation of the nose, throat, and upper respiratory tract.
4/1/12
18-wheeler/RV crash on I-35 kills 5 and seriously injures 13 others
Younger driver lacking a commercial driver's license ("CDL") lost control of the semi-truck, broke through a guardrail, and crashed into a ravine on I-35 in Kansas
Lawyers experienced in handling commercial vehicle and heavy truck crash cases understand the serious and permanent injuries that often result from accidents involving 18-wheelers, semi-trucks, dump trucks and other commercial vehicles. This accident, however, is one of the worst semi-truck accident lawyers have ever seen.
The other unique issue in this heavy truck/RV accident is the lack of a CDL for the driver who was able to drive without a CDL only because he was not driving a vehicle "for hire" like most big rigs are. This "loophole" will likely be reviewed in the coming year.
This 18-wheeler/RV accident resulted in 5 fatalities and sent 13 people to the hospital with serious and permanent injuries. The huge number of serious injuries is largely due to the nature of the accident which invovled a semi-trailer which had been converted into an RV and was full of children and adults who were not seat belted. The RV passengers were thrown about and hit by flying debris during the accident.
The National Transportation Safety Board says it will review details of a motor home crash in Kansas that killed five family members from Minnesota. The agency's review will include looking into laws that allowed a 17-year-old to drive the 57,000-pound semi-trailer which had been converted into a recreational vehicle ("RV"), which would normally require a commercial driver's license ("CDL")
NTSB spokesman Peter Knudson said Tuesday that the agency wants to determine whether the driver was "legally able to drive" such a large vehicle and whether the applicable laws and licensing requirements "could have played a role in this accident."
The 18-wheeler/RV crash happened Sunday as a large extended family and some friends returned from an annual motocross vacation in Texas. They were riding in a converted semi-trailer which functioned as an RV and did not have seat belts.
The semi-truck/RV broke through a guardrail on Interstate 35 in northeast Kansas and plunged into a ravine. 5 people were killed. 13 others, including the driver, were injured.
3/13/12
Dairy tanker truck crashes on I-35 in Overland Park, closing the highway
Semi-truck lost control and overturned, stalling traffic for hours and sending 5 people to the hospital with personal injuries
A representative for an area ambulance company said one person suffered life-threatening injuries. Five people were taken to the hospital, but are expected to recover from their injuries.
The semi crashed before 2 p.m. on I-35 near 75th Street. Both northbound and southbound lanes were closed. Northbound lanes reopened at 3:15 p.m. southbound lanes were closed until ~5:00 PM.
3/12/12
Semi-truck crashes near Lawrence, KS after another 18-wheeler sends a rock through it's windshield
Tractor-trailer hualing rock sent a large rock through the window, causing the second semi-truck driver to lose control and crash
Trucks carrying gravel, rock, or debris cause millions of dollars in property damage and hundreds of fatal or serious injury accidents each year in Missouri, Kansas, and elsewhere. These trucks create serious problems for other motorists whose vheicles may be damagedcausing them to lose control or to swerve, causing collisions with other vehicles or a loss of control.
A 49-year-old Independence, Missouri., truck driver was injured after he was struck in the face Wednesday night by a large rock that broke through the windshield of the semitrailer he was driving near Perry, Kansas.
According to a Kansas Highway Patrol report, Roberto Chevez-Enamorado lost consciousness after he was struck, and his truck went off U.S. Highway 24 to the left, crashing through a fence before stopping in a field. The accident occurred at 7:45 p.m. in the eastbound lane, about 1.5 miles east of Perry. Chevez-Enamorado, who was wearing a seat belt when the crash occurred, was taken to Stormont-Vail Regional Health Center in Topeka, where he was listed in fair condition on Thursday.
Kansas Highway Patrol Lt. Dan McCollum said Chevez-Enamorado told him he had just passed a rock hauler before the crash. Investigators believe the rock an estimated 1.5 times the size of a fist fell from the rock hauler without that drivers knowledge.
3/8/12
I-169 highway crash closes highway in Kansas City, MO
6 cars were involved in the collision
SIX! vehicles were involved in an accident that temporarily closed southbound lanes of US-169 just past 9 Highway earlier this morning at the start of the rush hour.
The highway was reoped a little before 7:30, but traffic was slow-going as drivers navigated through the backup.
No serious injuries were reported from the drivers or passengers in any of the vehicles.
The cause of the accident was not immediately clear, however highway crashes in the Kansas City area are often due to drivers who are not paying attention or following too closely.
3/1/12
Kansas City Missouri police idenitfy the 10 most dangerous intersections in Kansas City, Missouri
TOP 10 HIGH CRASH INTERSECTIONS
- 152 & N. FLINTROCK
- I-435 & FRONT ST.
- 59th St. & BRUCE R WATKINS DR
- I-435 & I-70
- 152 HWY & N. CHURCH RD.
- I-70 & BLUE RIDGE C/O
- 55th St. & BRUCE R WATKINS DR
- GREGORY & BRUCE R WATKINS DR
- 43rd St. & MAIN
- EASTWOOD TFWY & I435
Kansas City police released the above data on the most dangerous intersections in Kansas City, Missouri. These intersections are known all to well to drivers who must travel through them to get to work, school, etc. and these intersections are often the scene of serious injury accidents or fatality collisions.
Kansas City police have identified these locations to let the public know that Kansas City traffic patrol officers will be issues tickets for red light running, turning without a signal and other violations at these intersections.
INTERSECTION SAFETY FACTS
In 2003, more than 1.9 million intersection crashes occurred throughout the nation. Of those, red light running crashes accounted for 219,000 crashes, 181,000 injuries and approximately 1,000 deaths. (Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, IIHS, and Federal Highway Administration, FHWA, 2004)
Fifty-eight percent (58%) of all pedestrian injuries and twenty-one percent (21%) of fatal injuries to pedestrians occur in collisions with motor vehicles at intersections. (IIHS, 2005)
In 2004, there were more than 9,117 fatal "intersection" or "intersection-related" crashes nationwide. This accounts for approximately one of every five fatal crashes on our roads. (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, NHTSA, 2005)
In urban areas, nearly 50% of all crashes occur at intersections. (FHWA, 2005)
An overwhelming three-fourths (78%) of the American public believe more attention should be paid to making dangerous intersections safer for drivers. An even higher number, 85%, think they need to be made safer for pedestrians. (Louis Harris Poll, Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, 2001, 1999)
According to a survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Transportation and the American Trauma Society, 63% of Americans see someone running a red light at least a few times a week and, at most, once a day. One in three Americans knows someone who has been injured or killed by a red-light runner. (1998)
Far fewer crashes occur at intersections with roundabouts than at intersections with signals or stop signs. A study conducted in Maine of 24 intersections before and after the construction of roundabouts showed a 39% overall decrease in crashes and a 76% decrease in injury producing crashes. Collisions involving fatal or incapacitating injuries fell by almost 90%. (IIHS, 2000)
Older pedestrians are particularly at risk for injury or death at intersections. Thirty-six percent (34%) of pedestrian deaths among people age 65 and older in 2003 occurred at intersections. Many intersections permit pedestrian crossing, yet have signals timed to provide for the maximum movement of vehicles, not pedestrian traffic. (NHTSA, 2004)
Atlanta, Miami and Tampa are the three most dangerous cities for pedestrians. In these cities 59% of pedestrian fatalities occurred while the pedestrian was trying to cross in the middle of the street because no crosswalk was available. Lack of crosswalks is a major factor in making these cities such a dangerous place for walkers. (American Demographics, November 2000)
Over 40% of all pedestrian fatalities occur at intersections with no crosswalk. (NHTSA, 2004)
On average, a pedestrian is killed every 111 minutes in the U.S. (NHTSA, 2004)
2/27/12
Amazing video of an 18-wheeler colliding with an out-of-control SUV
This SUV semi-truck crash almost certainly led to the death or hospitalization of those riding in the sport utility vehicle
http://i.imgur.com/3Jk9X.gif
It goes without saying that an 18-wheeler & passenger car crash is very dangerous for those in the car, truck, or SUV, but this video demonstrates that fact tremendously.
2/22/12
Distracted driving prevention is a primary focus of traffic injury and fatality prevention organizations in 2012
THE THREE KEY ELEMENTS TO DECREASING DISTRACTED DRIVING
1. Put It Down.
Convincing drivers to put down all distracting devices such as cell phones, GPS, MP3 players is key to stopping distracted driving. Everyone needs to realize that they cannot pay full attention to the road while using these devices or engaging in other distracting activities.
2. Use Messages That Work.
After thoroughly examining the problem of distracted driving and the supporting data, three messages have stood out that will potentially move Americans to action. Use these key messages to help explain why Put It Down is so important to all of us.
Deadly behavior Thousands of people die and hundreds of thousands of injuries happen each year simply because people were not paying attention to the road. Whatever it is it can wait. The chances of causing a crash that could ruin lives is just too great.
Young drivers are at great risk Young, inexperienced drivers, under 20 years old have the highest proportion of distraction-related fatal crashes. Their lack of driving experience can contribute to critical misjudgments if they become distracted, yet they text more than any other age group. Its a trend that poses a growing danger, so its important to address this issue now.
Everyone has a role We all have a stake in this problem and we are all part of the solution. We must focus our attention on driving, be a good example to our children, our peers, and our community, and insist that when riding with others they do the same.
3. Implement a Three-Part Strategy.
In order to decrease distracted driving we must concentrate our efforts on three tracks simultaneously.
Public Education Generate awareness about Put It Down. Remind others that the price for not paying attention to the road is too high, and that we all have a part to play in making sure everyone keeps their eyes and mind on the road and hands on the wheel. Also, encourage community partners to join the Put It Down cause.
Legislation Work to encourage State legislatures to pass primary (standard) anti texting/hand held cell phone use bans in every State.
Enforcement Support local law enforcements efforts to seek compliance with States texting and cell phone use laws. Publicize your support of law enforcements efforts.
2/10/12
Nikki McClure, 33, is in critical but stable condition following the hit-and-run accident during rush hour on Interstate 35 near Gardner. The pregnant Gardner woman injured Wednesday in a hit-and-run collision with a semitrailer is improving at a hospital and has delivered a healthy baby girl, her husband said.
The Kansas Highway Patrol reported that she appeared to be driving at normal highway speed and the unknown truck driver was going much slower when she drove into the rear of the 18-wheeler's trailer. The Johnson County driver had to be extricated after the crash on northbound I-35 just north of 167th Street, and traffic backed up from there to Gardner.
The truck driver drove off with the hood of McClures Hyundai sedan impaled on the back of his trailer, the patrol said. The truck and its driver have still not been found, they said today.
If you have any information on the woman, you are asked to call the Kansas Highway Patrol.
2/08/12
The top of the woman's car was sheared off when her vehicle drove under a semi-tractor's trailer on I-35 in Johnson County
Heavy truck underride accidents happen when passenger cars, SUVs, or pickups collide with the rear end of an 18-wheeler's trailer, the bottom of which happens to be located above the hood of most passenger cars, trucks, and SUVs. The "A-pillars" of the car or truck are not designed to absorb this impact and the roof of the car or truck is often sheared off.
It goes without saying that semi-truck under ride crashes are often fatal and often lead to extremely serious injuries for drivers and passengers who may be decapitated or have serious and permanent brain, neck, and spine injuries.
These types of crashes are preventable, however, according to knowledgable engineers and truck accident lawyers. A semi-truck trailer under ride bar will prevent many of these accidents by allowing the car, truck, or SUV's bumper to impact a steel structure that allows the energy from the crash to dissipate. These safety bars turn otherwise deadly car-semi-truck crashes into walk-away accidents.
A rush hour hit-and-run crash critically injured a pregnant woman this morning and created a backup along northbound Interstate 35 in Johnson County that stretched from 167th Street to Gardner.
The Kansas Highway Patrol was looking for the driver of a semitrailer that was involved in the crash. Witnesses said they saw the semi drive off with the womans car hood impaled on the back of the trailer, according to Lt. Tom Catania with the Kansas Highway Patrol.
Emergency crews extricated the 33-year-old woman from her vehicle. The crash occurred about 6:50 a.m. in the northbound lanes of I-35 near the weigh station, just north of 167th Street, according to the Kansas Highway Patrol.
Witnesses described the truck as a semitrailer with an enclosed box, which is rather typical. Evidence suggests that the truck may have ice built up on it from traveling through icy areas, perhaps coming from up north. The truck might have significant damage to the trailers rear impact guards, if it was so equipped.
Anyone with information about the crash or the whereabouts of the driver and semitrailer is asked to call Catania at the Kansas Highway Patrols Troop A in Olathe at 913-782-8100.
2/5/12
Child injured in horrific crash with a heavy truck on a bridge
10 week old hospitalized in the amazing accident which left the car hanging off of the bridge and killed the 18-wheeler's driver
Today's vehicles are remarkably safe, especially if the occupants are belted or using proper car seats. This car is unrecognizable through the twisted sheet metal, but the passenger compartment remained intact enough for the 10 week old child and her mother to survive. Unfortunately, the driver of the truck involved was killed.
Police and firefighters were frustrated in their attempts to rescue a mom and her two daughters when their 3-series careened off the side of a bridge along the California coast. After hanging there for an hour, who happens along? A couple of SeaBees (Navy Engineers) with just the right forklift for the job.
What makes this rescue all the more remarkable is that, while the truck driver involved was killed, neither the mom or either of her 10-week old or 10-year old daughters was hurt. The police credit the baby's survival on the proper use of a rear-facing child seat placed not in the front, but in the back where it the car is most able to protect it.
The accident occurred when the tractor trailer allegedly struck the BMW from behind, pushing it through the guard rail while jackknifing itself off the bridge. The truck driver didn't have the same luck as the woman and her children, he was killed when his vehicle struck the river bed 100 feet below the bridge.
2/2/12
Watch a video of a vehicle almost being rear ended by an 18-wheeler on a snowy/icy highway:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=FhVGeIgLdlI
This video demonstrates the need to use maximum care when driving on Missouri & Kansas highways in snow/ice/poor traction conditions.
1/25/12
This is taking distracted driving to the extreme:
1/13/12
Columbia, Missouri man injured and hospitalized after being hit by an 18-wheeler and another car
The man had crashed into a snow plow before being hit by the two vehicles
A Columbia, Missouri driver is in critical condition in a Missouri hospital after being hit TWICE after being involved in a collision with a snow plow. The driver initially crashed head-on into a Missouri Department of Transportation snow plow on Missouri highway 62 early Thursday morning in Boone County.
Missouri Highway Patrol Troopers said that the driver was then hit by a car while walking along the highway. A few minutes later, the driver was hit by an 18-wheeler which led to extremely serious injuries. The driver is fortunate that he was not killed because pedestrian/18-wheeler accidents are seldom good for the pedestrians.
1/10/12
Based on preliminary crash report information, Colonel Ron Replogle, superintendent of the Missouri State Highway Patrol, wants to make the public aware of a 5 percent decrease in traffic fatalities in 2011 when compared to 2010. As of January 3, 2012, Missouri traffic crash fatalities totaled 779 for 2011, compared to 821 traffic crash fatalities in 2010. This is the first year since 1949 that Missouri has experienced less than 800 fatalities. I appreciate the tremendous enforcement and education efforts of troopers throughout the state, and I thank Missouris drivers for joining us in trying to make each year safer than the previous.
Note: The 2011 fatality statistics in this news release could change if late deaths occur, or if other departments report fatal traffic crashes after this news release was sent out.
1/6/12
Missouri Highway Patrol continues anti-texting campaign
The anti-texting while driving campaign is intended to encourage Missouris motorists to put down their phones and prevent traffic crashes from the dangerous distraction of texting while driving.
Inattention is a leading cause of traffic crashes, said Colonel Replogle. If youre focused on sending a text message, then you arent paying attention to your driving. Cell phone usage -- particularly texting while driving can lead to tragic consequences. These consequences are easily preventable if drivers would simply put down their phones and focus on the road."
Col. Replogle added that the campaign complements Missouris current anti-texting law, which prohibits use of texting devices for drivers 21 years of age and younger. He called on all Missouri drivers to honor the letter and the spirit of the law--regardless of age--and stop texting while driving to help make Missouris highways safer for all motorists. Missouri is one of 38 states in the nation to enact some type of anti-texting legislation.
In 2009, cell phone usage while driving contributed to more than 1,780 traffic crashes in Missouri. In the first half of 2010, there were 791 traffic crashes related to the use of cell phones behind the wheel resulting in eight fatalities and 239 injuries. Additionally, in this same time period, there were 17,535 crashes where distracted driving has been cited as a contributing cause.
Joining the MSHP in the campaign are trucking company Con-way Freight, one of Missouris largest freight carriers, and Roush Fenway Racing, one of NASCARs top racing teams.
1/2/12
Man injured by tree branch makes heroic effort to steer car to safety before he passes away
Tree branch was apparently launched by another car into the man's windshield
A Colorado man was able to steer the car to safety before losing consciousness after a 3 foot tree branch went through his window. His wife, who was riding in the passenger seat, told investigators that her husband was able to pull the Subaru Outback over to the roadside, saving her from any injury.
The deceased man was a theoretical physicist at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. His wife said that he had hoped to one day bicycle across America."He loved to be outside," Karen Baker-Jarvis said.
1/1/12
Kansas registers the 2nd highest jump in DUI-related fatality accidents in 2011
These statistics will likley lead to increased penalties and driving under the influence enforcment in Mission, Overland Park, Leawood, Prairie Village, and elsewhere in Johnson County, Kansas
Drunk driving defense lawyers have questioned the statistics surrounding "DUI fatality accidents for years. Often these numbers include any fatal auto accident in which the driver or passengers have been drinking ANY amount of alcohol or if there is alcohol in the vehicle. In other words, a "DUI-related fatal auto accident" would include a person who just left the grocery store with a case of been in their trunk and was t-boned and killed at an intersection.
In any case, regardless of the accuracy of the statistics, it is easy to predict that DUI-enforcment will become a hot topic in Johnson County and throughout Kansas for the next few years.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. Kansas had the second-highest jump in the number of drunken-driving fatalities in the nation in 2010, a year in which overall alcohol-related fatalities fell, according to federal data.
Statistics compiled by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration show 168 people died in such crashes on Kansas roads in 2010, the most recent year statistics are available. That's 45 more than were killed in 2009.
The Kansas City Star (http://bit.ly/tjjDoa ) reported nearly four in 10 highway deaths in Kansas were related to alcohol, according to the federal data.
"That statistic is stunningly bad," said Kansas Rep. Pat Colloton, a Leawood Republican.
Kansas trailed only New York, which saw its number of drunken-driving deaths rise by 46 in 2010. In Missouri, there were 44 fewer drunken-driving fatalities than in 2009, which is more in line with a national trend in which 32 states saw declines.
Overall, drunken-driving deaths were down about 5 percent nationally in 2010 compared with the previous year.
Kansas lawmakers have been struggling with ways to toughen laws to deal with repeat drunken drivers. In 2009, a state report characterized Kansas' system for dealing with repeated offenders as dysfunctional.
The report found that people drive drunk repeatedly in Kansas without risk of serious punishment, and that it can be hard to track repeat violators because drunken-driving arrests or convictions are sometimes not reported, or lost or discarded.
Colloton has teamed up with state Sen. Tim Owens, an Overland Park Republican, to find ways to fix the drunk driving enforcement and punishment system. Because of their efforts, the Kansas Legislature passed a law requiring first-time DUI offenders to have ignition interlocks placed on their vehicles, making Kansas one of 14 states that make the devices mandatory for all drunken-driving offenders.
The two also helped secure funding for a central records repository where drunken-driving convictions can be tracked statewide.
That change wouldn't have affected the 2010 numbers, but Owens said the 2010 statistics illustrate the need for the changes made this year.
Research indicates the ignition interlocks, which require a driver to blow into a breath-test device connected to the vehicle's ignition system, can reduce recidivism by 67 percent. A New Mexico study found a 32 percent decline in alcohol-related injury crashes from 2002 to 2006, a period in which interlocks were installed for 35 percent of all arrested offenders.
Missouri's drop of 44 deaths in 2010 represents a decline of about 15 percent over the previous year. Overall, about one-third of Missouri's highway deaths were alcohol-related.
12/20/11
Prosecutors allege that the driver was drunk and speeding when he ran a red light and collided with another driver in a Lawrence intersection
Douglas County district attorneys have filed an involuntary manslaughter charge against a 23-year-old Overland Park, Kansas man, accusing the defendant of killing a 19-year-old Lawrence woman in a 2010 drunken-driving crash in a Lawrence intersection.
The Lawrence Police Department report indicated that Sean Barrett Walkers blood-alcohol content was 0.23, nearly three times the states legal limit, two hours after the crash at the intersection of Clinton Parkway and Inverness Drive. Police have said they beleive that Walkers westbound vehicle struck a southbound car driven by Mary Grace Paez, a 2010 Lawrence High School graduate, killing her at the scene of the accident.
Douglas County District Attorney Charles Branson said Thursday his office issued an arrest warrant and charged Walker with involuntary manslaughter while driving under the influence of alcohol, plus two traffic infractions: speeding and violating flashing traffic signals. Walker is currently serving a prison sentence in Hutchinson for a probation violation on an unrelated 2006 Johnson County attempted robbery and battery case.
In the DUI involuntary manslaughter charge, prosecutors accuse the Overland Park man of unintentionally killing Paez while driving when his blood-alcohol content was higher than 0.08, the states legal limit to operate a vehicle.
The police report also lists Walkers speeding as contributing to the crash. He was headed west on Clinton Parkway and entered the intersection on a flashing yellow light as Paez was headed south on Inverness Drive and came into the intersection after she had stopped at a flashing red light. The Jeep struck her Nissan car on the drivers side. The law that covers flashing yellow lights says drivers may proceed through an intersection only with caution.
Walker was traveling at least 11 mph faster than the 45 mph speed limit on Clinton Parkway, and Paez was driving at 13 mph in the 30 mph zone, according to the accident report. Paezs toxicology test in her autopsy was negative for alcohol or drugs. Walker, who police said was treated at the scene for a head injury, refused to submit to testing, so officers obtained a warrant for the blood test.
If convicted of involuntary manslaughter, Walker faces from 38 months to 14 years in prison. Earlier this month a judge approved a $100,000 settlement for Paezs parents in a civil lawsuit against Walker. The settlement was reached with Walkers insurance carrier.
12/2/11
This is what it looks like when the semi-truck in front of you is involved in a head-on collision with another 18-wheeler:
http://i.imgur.com/LFuOG.gif
http://www.reddit.com/r/gifs/comments/ntg79/when_trucks_collide/
12/7/11
Tanker truck crashes in Olathe on 169, shutting traffic for hours
Gasoline had to be cleaned up from the overturned tanker truck which appeared to have gone too fast
A gasoline tanker truck overturned in Olathe today, causing Highway 169 to be closed during rush hour and into the evening. Police have not yet released details on the accident, but it appears that the truck driver may have taken a turn too fast and overturned.
Firefighters covered the spilled gasoline with a special foam and prevented it from igniting, the department said. It wasnt clear how much gasoline leaked, but a nearby Waffle House and Chilis restaurant were evacuated as a precaution.
11/21/11
Underride accidents occur when passneger cars and trucks go under an 18-wheeler/semi-trailer's trailer, leading to horrendous injuries or death
Underride collisions can be catastrophic for people in passenger vehicles that run into the backs of heavy trucks. The steel guards on the backs of big rigs are supposed to stop smaller vehicles from sliding underneath trailers, but a new Institute anal- ysis of real-world crashes indicates that too often rear guards intended to prevent underride buckle or break away from their trailers with deadly consequences. To understand how this happens, the Institute ran a series of crash tests and discovered that guards meeting federal safety standards can fail in relatively low-speed crashes. Based on this research, the Institute is petitioning the Na- tional Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to
require underride guards that are strong enough to remain in place during a crash and to broaden rules to mandate guards for more large trucks and trailers.
Any crash between a large truck and a passenger vehicle is a risky event. In 2009, 70 percent of the 3,163 people who died in large truck crashes were occupants of cars or other passenger vehicles. Underride makes death or serious injury more likely since the upper part of the passenger vehicles occupant com- partment typically crushes as the truck body intrudes into the vehicle safety cage. Rear guards are the main countermeasure for reducing underride deaths and injuries.
A 2009 Institute study and a similar one by NHTSA examined why people still die in crashes despite tremendous advances in passenger vehicle occupant protection. Underride crashes with large trucks were identified as among the most deadly
Cars front-end structures are designed to manage a tremendous amount of crash energy in a way that minimizes injuries for their occupants, says Adrian Lund, Institute president. Hitting the back of a large truck is a game changer. You might be riding in a vehicle that earns top marks in frontal crash tests, but if the trucks underride guard fails or isnt there at all your chances of walking away from even a rela- tively low-speed crash arent good.
NHTSA has estimated that about 423 people in passenger vehicles die each year when their vehicles strike the backs of large trucks. More than 5,000 passenger vehicle occupants are injured.
Pinpointing precisely how many large truck underride deaths occur each year is difficult because federal databases that track crashes are known to underestimate the incidence of underride. A 1997 Institute study estimated that underride occurred in half of fatal crash- es between large trucks and passenger vehi- cles (see Status Report, Feb. 15, 1997).
Real-world crashes: To identify crash patterns leading to rear underride of heavy trucks and semi-trailers with and without guards, Institute researchers analyzed case files from the Large Truck Crash Causation Study, a federal database of roughly 1,000 real-world crashes in 2001-03. Underride was a common outcome of the 115 crashes involving a passenger vehicle striking the back of a heavy truck or semi-trailer. Only 22 percent of the crashes didnt involve underride or had only negligible underride, a finding in line with prior studies.
Nearly half of the passenger vehicles had underride damage classified as severe or catastrophic, meaning the entire front end or more of the vehicle slid beneath the truck, resulting in loss of survival space in the occupant compartment due to intrusion. These vehicles accounted for 23 of the 28 crashes in which someone in the passen- ger vehicle died.
Many of the cases of severe underride involved trucks and trailers exempt from underride-related safety standards. More than half of the trucks in the study werent required to have guards, although many had them anyway. The two largest exempt groups were trailers with rear wheels set very close to the back of the trailer and straight trucks (single-unit trucks with a cab and cargo body on one chassis). Dump trucks represented a particularly hazardous category of straight truck. They accounted for about one-third of the straight trucks but half of all the straight truck crashes involving severe or catastrophic underride.
When trailers did have regulation guards, researchers identified 3 main failure modes. The most common reason was simply that the attachment between the guard and trailer was weak. This was the case in wide overlap crashes (involving the center of the guard) when the attachment between the guards vertical supports and trailer chassis broke where the guard was bolted or welded to the trailer. Weakness also was a problem in narrow overlap crashes where a passenger vehicle struck one outboard end of a guards main horizontal beam, causing it to bend forward or shear off completely. In the third type of failure, an underride guard remained attached to its trailer, but the trailer chassis itself buckled, causing the guard to rotate up and forward.
The Institute didnt attempt to compare the performance of under- ride guards built before and after the 1996 release of upgraded federal standards regarding guard size, strength testing, and energy absorption. NHTSA recently did try to see if guards complying with the rules that took effect in 1998 reduce death and injury risk for people in passenger vehicles. In a technical report published in late 2010, the agency said it couldnt identify a decline in underride deaths, mainly because the Fatality Analysis Reporting System doesnt record trailer model years and other details needed to deter- mine whether a particular trailer was covered by the current rule. Databases from North Carolina and Florida that contained model year information suggested there may have been an improvement, but the number of crashes was small and other details were missing so the estimates were inconclusive.
Crash tests: The Institutes study raised questions about how and why guards failed, so researchers followed up with a series of 6 crash tests evaluating 3 semi-trailer rear guards complying with US rules. Two of the trailers also are certified to Canadian requirements, which are more stringent than the United States when it comes to strength and energy absorption. The tests involved crashing a 2010 Chevrolet Malibu into the rear of parked trailers.
The goal wasnt to evaluate the Malibus crash-worthiness. The midsize sedan is an Institute TOP SAFETY PICK and earns a 5-star safety rating in NHTSAs New Car Assessment Program.
The aim was to see if some underride guards perform better than others and to identify what crash speeds and configurations produce different types of failure, Lund says. Damage to the cars in some of these tests was so devastating that its hard to watch the footage without wincing. If these had been real-world crashes there would be no survivors.
Decapitation is a threat in underride crashes. In 3 of the crash tests the heads of the dummies in the underriding car made contact with either the intruding trailer or the cars hood after it tore free and pushed into the occupant compartment. One such test involved a Hyundai trailer whose underride guard bent forward, sheared its attachment bolts, and broke after the Malibu hit it in the center rear at 35 mph. This was the weakest guard tested. The trailer was manufactured by Hyundai Translead, a San Diego, Calif.-based subsidiary of South Koreas Hyundai Motor Co.
In contrast, a Wabash trailer outfitted with a guard certified to Canadian specifications successfully prevented underride of the Malibus pas- senger compartment in a center-rear test at 35 mph. The trailer was manufactured by Lafayette, Ind.-based Wabash National Corp. Its guard was the strongest of the 3 evaluated.
Its clear to our engineers that Wabash understands how underride guards and trailers work together as a unit instead of treating them as separate components, Lund says. Strong attachments kept the Wabash guard in place so it could engage the Malibu, allowing the cars structure to absorb and manage the crash energy. In the real world, this would be a survivable crash.
Overlap tests are more challenging: To find out what happens when a car hits the trailer with only part of its front instead of head-on, the Institute ran offset tests with overlaps of 50 percent and 30 percent. When the Institute evaluates passenger vehicles in its frontal crashworthiness pro- gram, it uses a 40 percent overlap test at 40 mph.
In a 25 mph test with a 50 percent overlap, the guard on a Vanguard trailer tore away, allowing moderate underride. At 35 mph with the same overlap the underride was severe. The trailer was manufactured by Vanguard National Trailer Corp., a Monon, Ind. based subsidiary of China International Ma- rine Containers Ltd. The guard is certified to US and Canadian standards.
After the Wabashs good performance in the full-width test, engineers had high hopes for the offset tests. The guard successfully prevented underride in the test where the Vanguard failed (50 percent overlap at 35 mph), even though the struck end started to bend forward. The out- come for the Wabash was different when the overlap was reduced to 30 percent. The struck end of the guard again bent forward, and this time there was severe underride.
This test shows that even the strongest guard left as much as half of the rear of the trailer vulnerable to se- vere underride. The guard only worked as intended when the striking car engaged the center.
The best underride guard was a big improvement over the weakest one, but it still failed when hit near the outermost end of the guard, Lund says. Failures like this were among the most common in our analysis of real-world crashes. Canadas underride standard is tougher than US requirements but still not strong enough or comprehensive enough to prevent underride in crash configurations that cause many severe injuries.
Offset tests stress guards unsupported outboard ends. The vertical frame supports that attach guards to their trailer chassis are located closer to guards centers than ends. Preventing underride in narrow overlap crashes like these might mean devising a new way of attaching guards to trailers to utilize the side rails, in addition to requiring manufacturers to conduct compliance tests with guards on trailers.
Under current certification standards, the trailer, underride guard, bolts, and welding dont have to be tested as a whole system, Lund points out. Thats a big part of the problem. Some manufacturers do test guards on the trailer. We think all guards should be evaluated this way. At the least, all rear guards should be as strong as the best one we tested.
Another problem is that regulatory gaps allow many heavy trucks to forgo guards altogether. When they are present on exempt trucks, guards dont have to meet 1996 rules for strength or energy absorption.
Underride standards havent kept pace with improvements in passenger vehicle crashworthiness, Lund says. Absent regulation, theres little incentive for manufacturers to improve underride countermeasures, so we hope NHTSA will move quickly on our petition.
11/18/11
Insurance Institute of Highway Safety supports mandated vehicle recorders for all commercial trucks:
A long-awaited proposal from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) would re- quire interstate carriers to outfit trucks and buses with electronic recorders to make sure drivers comply with rules on how much time they can spend at the wheel. The recorders would replace the easily falsified handwritten logbooks drivers keep to catalog their work hours.
Onboard recorders reduce violations because they automatically record when a truck is driven. Their wider use would give carriers and drivers an effective tool to strengthen their hours of ser- vice compliance, FMCSA Administrator Anne S. Ferro said in unveiling the proposal Jan. 31.
Thats what the Institute has been saying for more than 20 years. The Institute first petitioned the federal government in 1986 to require record- ers in all large trucks. Since then, the Institute has submitted 4 additional petitions and more than 20 comments calling for an onboard recorder re- quirement (see Status Report, Oct. 7, 2006, June 15, 2007, and Feb. 14, 2009; on the web at iihs.org).
The agency should quickly move ahead with its proposed mandate for electronic onboard re- corders, says Anne McCartt, Institute senior vice president for research. Years of Institute re- search have documented the widespread work- rule violations among long-distance truckers, the association between violations and dozing at the wheel, and the increased percentage of trucks al- ready equipped with onboard recorders.
FMCSA seeks to broaden the use of recorders beyond the carriers that will be required to install them under a remedial directive published in April 2010. Slated to go into effect in June 2012, the rule applies only to carriers with a record of egregious hours of service violations. This group makes up a small fraction of all carriers (see Sta- tus Report, June 22, 2010).
The new proposal, which has the support of the American Trucking Associations, would affect about half a million carriers who use logbooks. The mandate would exclude short-haul interstate carriers that use timecards instead of logbooks.
11/3/11
Tractor-trailer rolls over after driver falls asleep, spilling mouthwash all over the highway
At least the highway will smell minty fresh!
A tractor-trailer crash resulting from the truck driver falling asleep closed a major highway in Tennessee on 11/2/11.
The crash could have easily led to a catastrophic injury for the driver or a passenger car/truck - not only did the semi-trailer roll onto it's side, it slid into a guardrail which penetrated and went through the cab of the truck.
There was one passenger in the cab of the truck, but she was not seriously hurt, however she did require a trip to the hospital by ambulance. was resting in the cabin but wasn't seriously hurt.
The 18-wheeler was carrying bottles of the mouthwash Listerine. Crews worked to clean up some diesel fuel that leaked from the truck.
11/2/11
Green light given to Mexican commercial vehicle drivers to drive 18-wheelers and other heavy trucks on American highways
Industry groups are warning of poor safety records for Mexican semi-trailers, poorly trained CDL drivers, and dangerously maintained Mexican tractor-trailers leading to serious crashes, injuries, and fatalities
WASHINGTON - - Mexican trucks can now deliver into and pick up freight in the U.S.A.
But the U.S.s biggest driver organization -- abetted by some disgruntled Democrats -- isnt taking the decision sitting down.
Within hours of U.S. Secretary Transportation Ray LaHoods trip to Mexico City to ratify a new three-year pilot program that would allow Mexican truckers into the U .S., the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA) filed a petition for review, asking a court to enjoin, set-aside, suspend (in whole or in part) or determine the validity of the implementation of this program."
OOIDA President Jim Johnston complained the deal was inked without any advance notice or warning to the public or Congress. "If the agreement is good for the U.S. why the hell is he (Secretary LaHood) sneaking down there to sign it? he said.
Conversely, within hours of the agreement being signed, the U.S. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) started accepting applications from Mexican trucking companies seeking operating permits. Industry experts predict the first Mexican trucks could cross the border within the month.
The battle dates back decades. The 1994 NAFTA agreement stated that trucks were allowed to cross American, Canadian and Mexican borders. But, pressured by unions and protectionist forces, President Bill Clinton shut the gates to the Mexicans, citing safety concerns.
Itd been off-again, on-again since, with both sides imposing tariffs. When George W. Bush was president, the two governments agreed on a pilot program what would allow some trucks to cross into the U.S.
Two years later, A Democrat Congress cut off the financing and Mexico, which responded with tariffs on over a 100 U.S. goods.
This week, the ban was ruled a violation of NAFTA and so, immediately tariffs were lifted on 99 U.S. products ranging from Christmas trees to pet supplies and the remaining tariffs will disappear when the first Mexican hauler proves it can meet FMCSA stipulations.
Some of those requirements are as follows:
Non-hazmat applicants will undergo pre-authorization safety audit covering the carrier's safety management system and equipment that will cross the border. It will include a drug and alcohol testing program, hours of service compliance verification, and insurance and driver qualifications, among other requirements.
Carrier who pass would get provisional operating beyond the 20-mile border commercial restriction zone for 18 months. After that, if the carrier has no enforcement violations and has cleared a compliance review, it can apply for permanent authority in the pilot program.
During the first three months of this stage, trucks and drivers will be inspected every time they cross into the U.S.
If safety standards continue to be maintained which include an out-of-service rate and Safety Management scores below the U.S. average -- the Mexican carrier can convert the pilot program operating authority into a standard permanent authority when the three-year pilot comes to and end.
Trucks will also need to be equipped with EOBRs (which the FMCSA will own and monitor the data itself) and drivers need to be proficient in English.
Business groups, including the United States Chamber of Commerce an the American Trucking Associations praised the move as a boost for job creation on both sides of the border.
11/1/11
MDOT planning on improving truck rest stations along I-70 in Missouri
The Missouri Department of Transportation said Tuesday that it had received a $1,000,000 grant to improve truck rest stops and build new truck parking/rest sites. MDOT is currently working to identify potential sites for truck parking lots and hopes to begin construction by late 2012.
Drivers of 18-wheelers, semi-trailers, tractor-trailers, dump trucks, and other commercial vehicles are subject to a number of state and federal regulations regarding the length of time they can drive and then hours they must rest after reaching their driving limits. The rules are intended to reduce driver fatigue and prevent accident involving heavy trucks.
In the past several years, Missouri already has doubled the number of truck parking places it offers along interstates. But the department says it must continue adding spots because the number of commercial vehicles on I-70 is forecast to double by 2030.
10/28/11
Minivan was "rear-ended" by the semi-trailer on the interstate highway , nearly destroying the vehicle and closing down the highway
This story demonstrates the importance of truck drivers paying attention to the road at all times and taking steps to insure that they have a proper following distance. Heavy trucks such as tractor-trailers, tractor-double-trailers, semi-trucks, dump trucks, concrete mixer trucks, and 18-wheelers are much heavier than passenger trucks, cars, and minivans. Consequently, heavy commercial vehicles cannot brake nearly as quickly or safely as cars, trucks, and minivans - in many cases a semi-truck or 18-wheeler's stopping distance will be twice or even 3 times that of a normal passenger vehicle.
Indiana State Patrol Troopers reported late Thursday that a minivan was carrying 10 people when it was hit along the Indiana Toll Road near Bristol, along the Michigan border.
Unfortunately, 7 of those people were killed in the accident and three were seriously injured.
Police say witness accounts suggest the minivan may have hit a deer, then slowed or stopped in the eastbound lanes before it was hit from behind by the truck. Seven of those in the minivan died at the scene and three others were taken to hospitals, including two who were airlifted. The driver of the tractor-trailer was also taken to a hospital.
None of the victims' names has been released. The conditions of those who survived also haven't been released.
10/22/11
Kansas Highway Patrol cracking down on aggressive driving
Troopers also focusing on passenger car safety near big trucks such as 18-wheelers,
The Kansas Highway Patrol will be conducting high-visibility enforcement operations during the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) Operation Safe Driver week. Enforcement activities will be conducted statewide on highways and local roads.
Each year more than 36,000 people die on the roadways throughout North America - many of which are the direct result of unsafe and aggressive driving practices by both passenger and commercial vehicle drivers. During the week of October 16-22, 2011, law enforcement across North America will respond by actively targeting these drivers during a campaign dubbed Operation Safe Driver.
"The Operation Safe Driver enforcement will help remind us all of important safety lessons we can use while driving. Sharing the road safely with all of those around us-passenger vehicles, commercial vehicles, buses, motorcycles, bikes-is inherent to the safety of every motorist who travels our nation's roadways," Colonel Ernest E. Garcia, Superintendent of the Kansas Highway Patrol said.
Operation Safe Driver will hold activities across the United States, Canada and Mexico that aim to increase commercial vehicle and non-commercial vehicle traffic enforcement; safety belt enforcement; driver roadside inspections; driver regulatory compliance; implementation of commercial driver educational and awareness programs to the motor carrier population; and, awareness to the motoring public about safe operations around commercial motor vehicles. For more information visit: www.operationsafedriver.org.
Operation Safe Driver also focuses on changing the habits of all drivers to avoid distracted driving. Check out www.defeatingdistracteddriving.org and www.distraction.gov for more information on this effort.
Motorists should remember the following safety tips when driving near a big truck:
- Stay out of the No-Zone. No-Zones are actual blind spots where the car "disappears" from the view of the truck driver.
- Stay visible! Large trucks need a much longer braking distance than a car. Don't cut into a trucks' space; if this happens it reduces a trucks' much needed breaking distance and restricts evasive action.
- Don't tailgate a truck. The further you are away from a truck, the less likely you will be involved in a collision.
- Don't speed. Obey all speed limits.
- Allow plenty of room. Large trucks are almost as wide as your lane of travel. Pacing too close behind one prevents you from reacting to changing traffic conditions and patterns.
- Buckle-up. Wearing your safety belt is the single most important thing you can do to save your life in a crash.
- Protect yourself and your passengers by learning how to share the road safely with large vehicles and avoid distracted driving.
10/15/11
Kansas trucker leads sheriffs and troopers on a high speed chase along I-70 across several Kansas counties
Rarely do you hear about a chase involving a heavy truck such as this driver's 18-wheeler, but when you do, the results are usually not good for car/truck drivers and passengers...
A Kansas tractor-trailer driver is in custody after he led Kansas Highway Patrol Troopers and other law enforcement on a high-speed chase in three northeastern counties. Law enforcement spokesman said the semi-truck driver forced motorists off Interstate 70 and deliberately rammed into two vehicles, sending their occupants to the hospital.
The trucker, from Salina, was in the Pottawatomie County jail in Westmoreland on a number of different charges. It is not known what the charges are, but safe to say that he won't be driving a big truck for awhile.
The chase began late Thursday after the trucker rammed his 18-wheel semitrailer into a pickup truck traveling on I-70 near Topeka. There were reports the semi was forcing other vehicles off the highway as well. The semi, followed by both the pickup and law enforcement, exited I-70 at Kansas highway 99 and continued north through Wamego and the smaller town of Louisville, where it rammed another car. The chase ended early Friday when the rig became stuck in a yard.
10/5/11
Tow-truck driver charged with several crimes after crashing into several cars in Kansas City, Missouri and sending one person to the hospital
Law enforcement said the man appeared to have been drinking before the crash.
Accidents like this are rare in Jackson, Johnson, and Wyandotte counties. Most professional drivers are fairly good drivers who take great care in their driving, and this tow-truck driver was far from it. Not only did the driver have a suspended driver's license, but he may have been drunk as well.
Our law firm has represented drivers and passengers injured by drivers with suspended licenses and who may have been under the influence of drugs, alcohol, or both. These cases are excellent personal injury/wrongful death cases in both Kansas and Missouri courts because not only is fault easy to prove, but these cases almost always support punitive damage claims as well.
A driver with a suspended driver's license has no right to be on the road at all, meaning that not only are they negligent for even driving, but there may also be an additional claim - for negligent entrustment - if they are driving a vehicle owned by someone who new they were not supposed to be driving. Our personal injury & wrongful death law firm has experience pursuing negligent entrustment claims in the Kansas City area.
Punitive damages are damages which are designed to punish wrongdoers and discourage those who are similarly situated. These claims can often result in settlements or jury verdicts well in excess of a client's actual damages for lost wages, hospital/therapy bills, and future medical treatment, disability, etc. Kansas and Missouri courts allow punitive damage claims for drunk drivers and for drivers who are driving on suspended licenses. Our Kansas and Missouri injury accident law firm has experience with punitive damage claims in Kansas and Missouri Courts.
In Kansas, the standard for determining whether a plaintiff should be allowed to amend a pleading to state a claim for punitive damages is set forth by statute, which states, in pertinent part:
The court may allow the filing of an amended pleading claiming punitive damages on a motion by the party seeking the amended pleading and on the basis of the supporting and opposing affidavits presented that the plaintiff has established that there is a probability that the plaintiff will prevail on the claim pursuant to K.S.A. 60-209, and amendments thereto.
K.S.A. 60-3703.
The Kansas Supreme Court has interpreted this provision as requiring a plaintiff to show that it is more likely than not that he will prevail on his punitive damages claim. Fusaro v. First Family Mortgage Corp., Inc., 257 Kan. 794, 801, 897 P.2d 123 (1995). In determining whether a plaintiff has met this burden, the trial court should take into account the clear and convincing standard of proof that that plaintiff will be required to meet at trial. Id.
Although the plaintiff bears the burden of establishing the probability that he will prevail on his punitive damages claim, the evidence is still viewed in a light most favorable to the plaintiff. The Kansas Supreme Court stated:
In making this threshold determination [of whether plaintiff has established that there is a probability that plaintiff will prevail on a punitive damages claim], the trial court is not to usurp the role of the jury. Credibility determinations, the weighing of evidence, and the drawing of legitimate inferences from the facts remain jury functions. The trial court is to consider the evidence presented in the opposing affidavits as well as other evidence in a light most favorable to the party moving for the amendment, and if the evidence is of sufficient caliber and quality to allow a rational factfinder to find that the defendant acted towards the plaintiff with willful conduct, wanton conduct, fraud, or malice, the trial court shall allow the amendment.
Id. at 802.
As stated above, in moving for amendment of the pleadings to assert a claim for punitive damages, the plaintiff bears the burden of establishing the probability that he will prevail on the claim at trial. Plaintiffs burden at trial with respect to a punitive damages claim is also set forth by statute:
In any civil action where claims for exemplary or punitive damages are included, the plaintiff shall have the burden of proving, by clear and convincing evidence in the initial phase of the trial, that the defendant acted toward the plaintiff with willful conduct, wanton conduct, fraud, or malice.
K.S.A. 60-3702(c).
Although the statute speaks in terms of willful conduct, wanton conduct, fraud or malice, Kansas courts have generally recognized that gross negligence falls within the scope of these terms. See, e.g., Trendel v. Rogers, 24 Kan.App.2d 938, 942, 955 P.2d 150 (1998)(citing Tetuan v. A.H. Robins Co., 241 Kan. 441, 481, 738 P.2d 1210 (1987))(punitive damages may be awarded whenever the elements of fraud, malice, gross negligence, or oppression arise in a dispute). A finding of gross negligence is generally characterized by knowledge or awareness of the danger associated with negligent conduct.
Kansas courts have also recognized that reckless disregard provides a sufficient basis to impose punitive damages. Specifically, Kansas courts have recognized that a wanton act is [a]n act performed with a realization of the imminence of danger and reckless disregard or complete indifference to the probable consequences of the act. Cerretti v. Flint Hills Rural Elec. Co-op. Assn., 251 Kan. 347, 367, 837 P.2d 330 (1992). In other words, a wanton act is something more than ordinary negligence but less than a willful act. It must indicate a realization of the imminence of danger and a reckless disregard and indifference to the consequences. Id. at 368.
Taken together, these authorities indicate that reckless disregard or grossly negligent conduct is sufficient to support imposition of punitive damages. Thus, if the defendant acted negligently, and is aware, or should be aware, of the danger associated with such negligent conduct, then the defendants conduct may be characterized as grossly negligent and will provide a basis for the imposition of punitive damages. Similarly, if a defendant acts with reckless disregard for whether his or her actions will pose a danger to others, then his conduct is wanton and will be sufficient to support the imposition of punitive damages.
In Kansas, punitive damages are awarded to punish the wrongdoer for his malicious, vindictive or willful and wanton invasion of anothers rights, with the ultimate purpose being to restrain and deter others from the commission of similar wrongdoings. Folks v. Kansas Power and Light Co., 243 Kan. 57, Syl. No. 6, 755 P.2d 1319 (1988).
A Kansas City man has been charged with second-degree assault and driving with revoked licenses in connection with a crash that damaged several cars downtown on Saturday night.
Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker announced the charges against Floyd R. Helton on Sunday.
Court records state that Helton was identified by several witnesses as being the driver of a tow truck that was traveling at a high rate of speed on Ninth Street just after 5 p.m. when he ran a stop sign and collided with another vehicle causing injuries to the other driver.
Records state that the struck vehicle slid into parked cars causing more damage. Emergency responders said Helton showed sign that he had been drinking. Helton told officers that he had been drinking earlier in the day, court records show.
Helton told police he had suspended driver's licenses in Kansas and Arkansas, and had surrendered his Missouri license to Arkansas.
Check out KMBC for more info
9/1/1/11
Concrete mixer truck rolls over on K-10 in Johnson County, injuring driver
Our law firm's lawyers have experience with heavy truck/vehicle accidents claims/lawsuits in Kansas and Missouri. Our law office has successfully represented clients severely and permanently injured in accidents with 18-wheelers or other heavy trucks.
Our firm's attorneys understand the physics involved in these accidents as well as the serious and catastrophic injuries that often result. Our staff and serious injury lawyers also understand the regulations that must be followed by heavy truck companies and drivers and that financial pressures often lead semi-truck drivers and companies to cut corners which can lead to accidents.
Kansas Highway 10 near Eudora was completely shut down for more than six hours while the Kansas Highway Patrol's commercial vehicle accident reconstruction team investigated a serious accident involving a heavy truck (concrete mixer) from earlier Thursday afternoon.
In the K-10 heavy truck accident, a concrete mixer truck blew a tire, causing the driver, identified as 44-year-old Tonganoxie resident Richard Vandruff, to lose control of the vehicle, according to a report from the KHP. Vandruff swerved onto the north shoulder of westbound K-10 before veering back across the lanes onto the median, where the vehicle then rolled before coming to rest on its side. Vandruff was trapped in his truck for more than 30 minutes while Lawrence Douglas County Fire Medical tried to rescue him. He was taken to a regional trauma center for treatment.
Earlier accidents included a car-motorcycle accident at milemarker 397 on U.S. Highway 24/40, shortly after 3:30 p.m. One person had critical injuries, and at least one other person had sustained unknown, less serious injuries.
According to a report from the Kansas Highway Patrol, the accident occurred when the vehicle in front of the motorcycle stopped suddenly. The driver and passenger on the motorcycle, identified as Manhattan residents Donald H. Burnett, 63, and Doreen H. Burnett, 65, were thrown from the vehicle when Donald attempted to brake.
Donald Burnett was to be taken by LifeStar helicopter to KU Hospital, however another accident was reported at the same time and the helicopter was dispatched to that accident instead. The KHP report lists both patients as being transported to KU Hospital and LMH, respectively. Nursing supervisors at each location had no additional information on the patients' conditions Thursday night. The report states neither patient was wearing a helmet at the time of the accident.
The third accident was reported in the eastbound lanes of the Kansas Turnpike, just west of the Lecompton interchange.
According to a report from the Kansas Turnpike Authority, the first vehicle, driven by 29-year-old Fort Riley resident Eugene Hookano Pok Riddick II, lost control and struck the side of the second vehicle. Both vehicles crossed over all lanes of traffic, with the second vehicle rolling and coming to rest on its passenger side. The driver and passenger in the second vehicle, identified as Florida couple Robert and Joyce Berkoski, were transported to an area hospital with unknown injuries. Riddick II was also transported to an area hospital after his vehicle came to rest in the south ditch. A LifeStar helicopter was called to assist in patient transportation. The Turnpike was closed briefly to allow the helicopter to land on the road, but has since reopened.
8/25/11
Truck driver continues driving his route with a severely damaged cab
American truckers may not getthe respect they always deserve, but they're rarely as bold as this Chinese semi driver caught enjoying the breeze from his windshield-free bobtail at 50 mph.
Caught byCar News China, the truck was snapped by a passing motorist in southern China near the town of Desheng. It's either just a wrecked cab that will get rebuilt, or Nissan's commercial division is testing its own answer to the Murano CrossCabriolet.
Thanks to Jalopnik for the story
8/20/11
18-wheeler crashes into sign on interstate
Driver apparently activated his dump trailer while driving, causing it to crash into the sign and separating it from the cab. The driver was not injured.
When I saw this picture of a semi-trailer truck trailer crashed into an overhead highway sign on I-45 in Houston, I probably had the same thought you did. How does a professional truck driver do this?
Somehow, the truck's bed's hydraulic arm engaged while driving. Raised up into the air at a nearly 90-degree angle, the empty bed smashed into an overhead beam, striking a green interstate sign, disengaging itself from the cab of the truck. There the bed sat, seemingly suspended in air, attached to the sign.
Thankfully, the driver wasn't harmed in the late Tuesday afternoon accident. Houston TransStar, the local transportation and emergency management agency, says the driver has no memory of engaging the lifter while on the road.
Houston authorities had to close part of the city's North Freeway while the statecut down the bracing to get the trailer off, leaving hundreds of people stranded in the city's now standard 100-degree heat. The trucking company will have to carry the costs of repairing the damage to the signs, which thestate estimates at a cool $100,000.
8/15/11
The 18-wheeler hit a train leading to injuries for the 3 Springfield, MO residents
This story is a rare bright spot in what are normally fatal wrecks with trains. It appears that the quick thinking of the tractor-trailer's driver is all that saved him, his girlfriend, and his child from certain death. Collisions with trains are almost always fatal because trains are not able to stop quickly (it usually takes more than a mile) and their massive size simply turns passenger cars and even 18-wheelers into a mess of twisted metal.
SENECA, Kan. Three Springfield, Missouri, residents were seriously injured after the tractor-trailer they were traveling in collided with a freight train early Saturday in Nemaha County.
The Kansas Highway Patrol said the semi-trucks driver, Marcus Andrew Taylor; and two passengers, Kimberly L. Hodson and their son Marcus Taylor, were all taken to Nemaha Valley Community Hospital in Seneca, Kan. with serious injuries.
Ms. Hodson and Marcus were in the sleeper compartment of the truck at the time of the accident.The patrols report said the collision happened at 4:15 a.m., on westbound U.S. Highway 36 at mile marker 324.9, in Seneca.
Mr. Taylor was driving a 1987 Kenworth tractor-trailer westbound on the highway, and did not see railroad crossing lights due to fog. He swerved the semi to the right to avoid striking the train. The truck took out the crossing arm and struck the train.The trains conductor and engineer were unhurt, the patrols report added.
8/1/11
Many drivers are pushing for cable barriers to be installed to protect against deadly cross over accidents which seem all too common on K-10.
Our law firm has handled auto accident cases throughout Kansas and Missouri, however one highway seems to have the highest rate of serious accidents, at least per mile. K-10 has seen a high number of serious car collisions - many of them head on - leading to hospitalization and even fatal injuries.
Why is K-10 so dangerous? Why are there so many serious auto accidents on K-10 involving catastrophic injuries and death? The answer is that there are a number of factors which make K-10 so deadly.
First, K-10 is dangerous because of the types of drivers who use it. K-10 runs from Johnson County (Olathe/Lenexa) to Lawrence, where the University of Kansas is located. This means that the percentage of teen and younger drivers is inordinately high on K-10. Teens and younger drivers are statistically more likely to be involved in serious auto accidents than other drivers because they are not as experienced and may not be as good of defensive drivers as older drivers.
Second, K-10 is dangerous due to the heavy traffic from commuters. Lawrence is a fun town to live in and Johnson County is a great place to work. As a result, a lot of folks commute from Lawrence to work in Overland Park, Olathe, Leawood, Lenexa, Shawnee, Merriam, etc. K-10 is the only practical way for most folks to get from Douglas County, so it becomes very busy during the morning rush hour and the evening rush hour. More traffic means there is less room for error for drivers and traffic also increases the odds that a vehicle crossing over the center divider will be involved in a head-on impact.
Finally, K-10 is dangerous because there is only a grass divider between oncoming lanes. Without a concrete divider or cable barrier, there is nothing to stop cars from crossing through the divider and causing a fatal head-on collision. This has led to many folks advocating that the Kansas Department of Transportation ("KDOT") install cable barriers. In May, KDOT officials said K-10 had 11 fatalities resulting from 10 cross-median crashes since 2000, compared with 104 fatalities from 89 cross-median crashes on all Kansas four-lane highways.
One of these advocates is Briana Arensburg who was seriously injured in a K-10 crossover accident. A trailer impacted the side of her SUV which rolled over and a trip to the hospital. She did not take this accident lightly and formed a facebook group to push for the installation of cable barriers. Thousands of other users have signed up and it appears to have worked.
Johnson County recently voted to install cable barriers along K-10 and supporters are hoping that Douglas County follows suit. A Lawrence newspaper story is available HERE.
7/28/11
Semi-trailer & 18-wheeler fuel truck involved in crash near Lawrence in Douglas County, Kansas
Accident involved one truck shearing off the front of the other truck - no word on injuries
A rock hauling semi-trailer truck and an 18-wheeler fuel tanker were recently involved in a collision on the outskirts of Lawrence, in Douglas County, Kansas. The collision happened during daylight hours when a fuel tanker truck sheared off the front of a semi-trailer that appeared to be carrying gravel.
The crash was being investigated by the Kansas Highway Patrol - there is no word on whether either driver was injured or hospitalized.
7/20/11
A serious crash between an 18-wheeler and a sport utility vehicle towing another SUV led to an explosion and fire on the Kansas Turnpike (I-35) near 143rd Street East in Wichita. The explosion and resulting fire were visible from almost a mile away Tuesday morning, according to an emergency dispatcher for the Kansas Highway Patrol.
Four men in their 30s were transported to Via Christi on St. Francis with burn injuries after the crash. Two of the men were in critical condition with serious burns, while the other two were hospitalized in serious condition with major burn injuries.
Highway Patrol Lt. John Lehnherr said a tractor-trailer rig driver didn't realize how slowly the men were traveling, nor that they'd suffered a blowout, and he hit the trailer from behind. The men were traveling in a 1999 Chevrolet Tahoe towing a trailer with another Jeep Cherokee on it, when a tire on the trailer holding the second SUV apparently blew out. This led to the semi-trailer rear-ending the trailer from behind which apparently caused a fuel tank on the semi to rupture and spread fuel along the highway. The semi trailer then caught fire as well.
Flames from the crash were visible from almost a mile away, according to an emergency dispatcher. People at different locations on the Turnpike called in, she said.
Once the trailer was hit, it detached and stopped on the shoulder. The Jeep came off and overturned in the middle of the right lane. The SUV entered a ditch, where it stopped.
The driver of the semi-trailer, who is from Gardner Kansas (in Johnson County, KS) was not injured significantly enough to require transport to the hospital.
The accident and resulting fire led to I-35 being closed for several hours.
This accident demonstrates a number of principles the personal injury and wrongful death attorneys in our Olathe law office are familiar with. Highway accidents, especially involving semi-trucks, are extremely dangerous for drivers and passengers in cars, pickup trucks, and SUVs.
The semi-truck's fuel tank was dangerously exposed and a severe fire risk:
First, the fire which led to the SUV driver and passenger's critical and severe burns seems preventable. Many 18-wheelers, especially older models, utilize "side saddle" fuel tanks such as these:
These types of fuel tanks sit exposed on heavy commercial vehicles and are easily damaged or ruptured in a crash, especially on the highway. Once ruptures, their contents will spray all over the road, other vehicles, or bystanders, creating an enormous risk of a post collision fuel fed fire ("PCFFF"). These sorts of fires often lead to horrendous deaths or serious burn injuries for drivers and passengers of cars, trucks, and SUVs who may be unconscious or trapped in a vehicle.
Burn injuries are some of the worst injuries that result from an auto accident or tractor-trailer accident in Missouri or Kansas:
Second, this accident led to serious burn injuries for 4 people. Our Kansas City metro area fire & burn injury law firm has and is handling a number of personal injury and wrongful death cases and we understand the extreme pain and disfigurement that often result from car, truck, SUV, and 18-wheeler collision fires.
Burns are rated by degree: 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, with 3rd degree burns being the most serious and often including nerve and muscle tissue damage. Additionally, if flames or superhot gasses are inhaled by those trapped in the post collision fire, the lungs can be severely burned leading to years of complications or death. Auto accident burns are very susceptible to infection as well because the skin's protective layer is compromised.
Many burns will require months or years of treatment and rehabilitation. Skin grafts are often necessary after a person is burned in an auto collision, these grafts are extremely painful and often need to be repeated several times. Plastic surgery is often also required because to prevent or reduce scarring.
Unfortunately, our serious burn injury law firm's Kansas & Missouri personal injury attorneys have had to review thousands of medical records detailing our clients' burn injuries, pain, suffering, scarring, rehabilitation and treatment. Burn injuries almost always entail hundreds of thousands dollars in medical expenses, tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost wages, and seemingly limitless other expenses.
6/21/11
Semi-truck overturns, closing Kansas City highway
A semi-tractor trailer overturned this morning in Kansas City, Kansas, forcing the closure of southbound Seventh Street Trafficway at Interstate 70 shortly after 8 a.m.
The semi was leaking some diesel fuel, so hazmat crews had to be called in to collect and clean up the leaking fuel . Excessive speed reportedly played a role in the 18-wheeler's crash.
6/15/11
Truck companies and truck drivers excited to see speed limits on certain Kansas Highways increased to 75mph
Increased speed limits will allow truckers to move their cargo through Kansas a bit faster, decreasing costs
Starting on the first of July, the speed limit on certain Kansas highways will increase to 75mph, accelerating travel through the State. IN some instances, drivers could save nearly an hour, if they were driving along I-70 from the Missouri border to the Colorado border. The following sections of highway will see the increased 75mph limit:
The Kansas Turnpike from the Oklahoma border to Kansas
- Highway 7 in Wyandotte County will increase to 75 mph from 70 mph
- Interstate 70, from the Colorado state line to just west of Topeka in Shawnee County.
Interstate 135, from a half-mile north of the 85th Street interchange in Harvey County to I-70 near Salina.
Interstate 35 from U.S. Highway 50 just east of Emporia to a mile east of the Sunflower/Edgerton Interchange in Johnson County.
U.S. Highway 81 from I-70 near Salina north to Kansas Highway 106.
U.S. 69 Highway from just north of the north junction of U.S. 54 in Bourbon County to the 199th Street Interchange in Johnson County.
5/15/11
Stopped motorists killed by semi-truck driver on freeway
Driver and passenger were standing by their disabled vehicle when they were struck by the 18-wheeler
Two people standing outside their cars after a Southern California freeway collision have been struck and killed by a semi-truck on the freeway
The eastbound lanes of the Pomona Freeway, State Route 60 about 30 miles east of downtown Los Angeles, were shut down at 3:14 a.m. and didn't reopen until 3 1/2 hours later.
Traffic was re-routed around the wreckage.
California Highway Patrol Sgt. Keith Phillips tells KTTV Fox 11 News that three vehicles were involved in the first crash and a Mustang and Lexus were left disabled on the shoulder.
He says the two drivers were standing outside their cars when the big rig veered over and struck them and the vehicles.
The truck driver was taken to a hospital.
Information from: KTTV-TV, http://www.fox11la.com/
5/1/11
Who regulates commercial vehicles (heavy trucks, 18-wheelers, semi-trucks, big rigs, etc.) in Kansas?
The Kansas Corporation Commission (KCC) is the regulating agency for the commercial trucking industry in our state. They adopt motor carrier safety regulations and administer the economic regulations governing commercial motor vehicle operations in Kansas. Highway Patrol Troopers and Motor Carrier Inspectors enforce the regulations by performing roadside inspections and staffing inspection and weigh stations on major highways. In addition, special investigators from the KCC and Highway Patrol perform in-house audits and safety compliance reviews of motor carriers to ensure the industry abides with state and federal regulations.
If you operate a vehicle or combination of vehicles that have a weight rating or combination weight rating of more than 10,000 pounds, and you are hauling for hire or hauling your own materials in the furtherance of your own commercial enterprise, you are most likely regulated. Regulated carriers must follow motor carrier safety regulations, including, but not limited to, hours of duty, required semi-annual medical examinations, minimum age restrictions, methods of securing loads, safety hitches, trailer braking systems, tires, emergency equipment, periodic/annual inspections, and required markings (company name and USDOT number).
3/24/11
Semi-Trailer truck crashes and overturns, spilling eggs all over the roadway
Slippery roads caused the 18-wheeler to jack-knife, lose control, and crash
Large & heavy trucks such as tractor-trailers have an extremely difficult time traveling on highways for a number of reasons. Our Kansas City trucking accident law firm's attorneys understand how trucks jack-knife, the tendencies of semi-trucks & 18-wheelers to lose traction on snowy, icy, or wet roadways, and the severe injuries and deaths that often result from a jack-knifed commercial vehicle.
First, the trailer (or trailers) are significantly longer than the tractor (the truck) that is pulling them. This means that the trailer can lose traction and "pull" the tractor off of it's intended course, a situation that is nearly impossible to recover from. Poor maintenance, such as driving with balding tires can exacerbate this tendency, making a jack-knife all but certain in slippery highway conditions.
Second, jack-knife can be caused by poorly maintained trailer brakes. If the trailer's brakes are not properly calibrated, then the truck pulling the trailer may be pulled of course by the trailer which is still traveling and has a tendency to want to pass the vehicle pulling it. Once this happens, the 18-wheeler's driver faces an almost impossible task of preventing a jack-knife.
Third, semi-truck jack-knifes can be caused by loads shifting on the trailer. Shifting loads often occur in turns or during abrupt maneuvers, however a load shift can be caused by improper loading or securing of the trailer's load. A sudden load shift can cause the truck to jack-knife, leading to an accident.
For more, see http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/dpp/news/minnesota/semi-jackknifes-on-94,-scrambles-load-of-eggs-mar-23-2011
3/21/11
Overland Park Semi-truck crash on I-35 & 435 interchange leads to gridlock, injuries, and hospitalization
18-wheeler driver was trapped for nearly 3 hours as rescue workers attempted to free him so he could be treated at a local hospital
When tractor-trailers are involved in accidents in Kansas and Missouri, it is seldom the truck driver who is injured or killed, but rather the drivers and occupants of other vehicles. This is because the massive weight of commercial vehicles such as big rigs usually lead to catastrophic damage to passenger vehicles. Our Kansas & Missouri law office's 18-wheeler injury accident attorneys have handled numerous cases involving serious injuries or deaths to those involved in semi-truck accidents
This Johnson County semi-truck accident was clearly different as the truck driver was the one with injuries and a trip to the hospital. It appears that the driver was driving too fast on an interchange ramp at I-35 and 435, causing his truck to overturn ("rollover") and crash. Tractor-trailer rollover accidents are often caused by driver error, but may also be due to improperly loaded trailers which shift while the 18-wheeler is traveling down the road, causing the driver to lose control.
3/14/11
Stay out of the "no zone" the blind spot in most 18-wheelers, semi-trucks, and tractor trailers
Many accidents involving 18-wheelers, semi-trucks, and tractor-trailers involve drivers of passenger cars or trucks driving in the heavy truck's blind spot, often referred to as the "no-zone," and displayed in the pictures below.
Drivers of heavy trucks are literally "blind" in the listed areas, meaning that if the driver wants to change lanes, then he or she might not see the passenger car and cause a collision, likely leading to massive injuries for the passengers and drivers in the car or truck.
3/12/11
Tour bus crashes, leading to 14 deaths and 19 seriously injured
Bus driver told police that the a tractor-trailer had side swiped the bus, causing it to flip on its side and skid into the sign pole which sheared off the roof, leading to decapitations and deaths
A tour bus packed with passengers returning from a casino crashed into a highway sign pole after it turned on its side following what the driver claimed was a collision with an 8-wheeler. The cause of this bus-truck crash is unknown, however authorities are focusing on the bus driver's actions and a "phantom" tractor-trailer which may have caused the bus to careen out of control.
The result of the interstate accident was that 14 people were killed and dozens others sent to the hospital. The investigation was taken over by the highway patrol, which is often the case when multiple fatalities or commercial vehicles are part of an accident.
The lawyers in our Kansas & Missouri trucking & commercial vehicle accident law firm have experience handling 18-wheeler cases involving fatalities and serious personal injuries. We understand that the enormous size of these vehicles will often lead to horrific injuries or deaths when they crash.
Our Olathe wrongful death law firm also understand the government regulations which must be followed by commercial vehicles and "common carriers" of passengers. These rules and regulations govern the maintenance of the vehicles and equipment, as well as the driver's of those vehicles.
The rules and regulations require periodic inspections of braking and steering components, among other equipment. Heavy trucks and commercial vehicles often utilize "air brakes" which are substantially different from the hydraulic brakes in passenger cars and trucks. Our Kansas City law office's truck crash attorneys understand how 18-wheeler/heavy truck brakes work, the maintenance requirements for them, and how injuries and deaths can result from poor maintenance or inspection. So far, in this case, there is not indication of faulty equipment, but it is not common for defective suspension, braking, or steering components to be discovered and analyzed weeks or even months later.
Our Johnson County truck collision lawyers also understand the rules and regulations for Semi-truck and commercial vehicle drivers. These driving hours rules dictate how many hours a driver may drive before having to rest for a specified number of hours. By proving that a truck or bus driver did not comply with work hour requirements, we can help our client's maximize the value of their cases, perhaps leading to a punitive damage award designed to discourage other trucking companies and common carriers from repeating the bad conduct.
There are some indications that the driver may have been sleepy as several witnesses and passengers described the bus going over "rumble strips" several times before the crash occurred.
Check out the New York Times for more info.
3/10/11
Police officer learns why you do not want to drive in an 18-wheeler's blind spot - especially when the truck is making a wide right turn
Patrol car was in the trucks blind spot and attempted to pass on the right side, leading to a collision and damage to the police car.
18-wheelers, tractor-trailers, and semi-trucks all make wide turns due to the length of their trailers as compared to the length of the cab. The trailer will track to the inside of the turn, meaning the CDL equipped truck driver must turn the cab of the heavy truck much wider than in a passenger car because the 18-wheeler's trailer will make a "shallower" turn.
Additionally, heavy commercial vehicles such as semi-trucks, 18-wheelers, and tractor-trailers have huge blind spots where they cannot see vehicles in their mirrors. It is highly advised that passnger car and truck drivers do not linger in these blind spots because if the truck driver decides to change lanes or turn, he will not be able to see you and you could end up with a crushed car like the police officer in the video below.
Our law firm's Johnson County (Overland Park, Shawnee, Merriam, Olathe) 18-wheeler accident lawyers understand how semi-truck collisions often occur and how they can lead to serious injuries (such as paralyzing or brain injuries) or deaths to those in the passenger car or truck. Our semi-truck injury law office's attorneys have represented clients on tractor-trailer injury and fatality cases in Missouri and Kansas, including jury trial experience.
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3/4/11
This story once again demonstrates the deadly nature of semi-truck/tractor-trailer & car/pickup truck collisions in Kansas. Our Kansas & Missouri law firm's truck accident lawyers understand the factors which often lead to heavy truck - car crashes and the serious injuries that result from them, such as brain injuries, paralyzation, permanent disability, scarring, pain, and suffering. If you, a friend, or family member have been injured or killed in an accident involving a commercial vehicle such as a heavy truck, 18-wheeler, or semi-trailer, our law firm can collect economic damages compensation for monetary compensation and reimbursement for past, present, and future medical expenses and lost wages, and funeral expenses. Our Jackson County law office's trucking lawyers can also collect non-economic damages for wrongful death, loss of care, comfort, and counsel, pain, suffering, disfigurement, scarring, and other injuries. Our Johnson County law firm's attorneys have experience with trucking fatality cases in Western Kansas, elsewhere in Kansas, and in Missouri, including jury trial experience in trucking wrongful death claims. To be safely operated, commercial vehicles such as 18-wheelers and tractor-double-trailers must be properly maintained and driven by well trained drivers who understand the laws of the road and for operating a heavy truck with a commercial driver's license (CDL). When our serious injury trucking lawyers file lawsuits in Kansas, Missouri, or in Federal Court, we request the driving and operating records for the truck driver, including their driver's log book showing miles driven and hours driving and resting. Our Olathe law office's wrongful death lawyers also request the maintenance records for the 18-wheeler or semi-truck involved in the collision to look for any gaps in maintenance or unrepaired problems with the truck or the trailer. Feel free to call us at (866)656-1268 to speak to one of our firm's trucking injury accident lawyers and to set up a no-cost consultation.
Dodge City, Kansas
A late-night accident on U.S. Highway 283 and U.S. Highway 50 claimed three lives and sent another victim to the hospital in critical condition.
Four people in a van heading southbound on U.S. Highway 283 failed to yield at a posted stop sign and were struck by a westbound semi-tractor trailer shortly before midnight yesterday, Kansas Highway Patrol public resource trooper Ron Knoefel said Thursday.
The vehicles went into the south ditch and caught fire.
"Investigation into their identities continues because of the fire," Knoefel said.
The driver of the semi-tractor trail was not transported to the hospital and received minor injuries.
Thanks to the Dodge City Journal for the story
3/1/11
New study from Insurance Institute of Highway Safety (IIHS) shows that the lack of heavy truck underride guards is causing needless deaths and serious injuries
18-wheeler underride accidents often lead to serious or fatal brain injuries, paralyzation, permanent disability, and medical expenses
Our Kansas & Missouri law firm's heavy truck (18-wheeler/semi-trailer) underride lawyers have experience with trials and successful settlements in wrongful death and serious personal injury lawsuits involving 18-wheelers, tractor-double-trailers, semi-trucks, and other heavy vehicles. Our Kansas and Missouri law office's wrongful death & personal injury attorneys understand the huge forces in play in a passenger car or truck collision with a heavy truck and we work hard to maximize the economic recovery for our clients.
Underride guards are an easy way to prevent dozens of deaths and serious injuries each year, yet they are not required equipment for trucks. These guards act to prevent cars and pickup trucks from impacting their A-pillars on the semi-truck's trailer. These impacts lead to brain injuries, paralyzation, and even death in a great number of heavy truck cases.
The guards on tractor-trailers designed to stop the back of a truck full of 20-gallon mayonnaise drums from decapitating you in a rear-end collision are often worthless even in crashes as slow as 35 mph, according to insurance industry tests.
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's (IIHS) research is the first in recent memory to look at so-called underride crashes. Federal data shows that about 420 people a year die and some 5,000 are injured from vehicles striking the back of semi trailers, and the IIHS estimates that roughly four-fifths of such crashes involve vehicles sliding under the back of trailers, raising the chances that the trailer will shear into the passenger space.
"You might be riding in a vehicle that earns top marks in frontal crash tests," said IIHS President Adrian Lund, "but if the truck's underride guard fails - or isn't there at all - your chances of walking away from even a relatively low-speed crash aren't good."
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration last updated the rules for underride guards 15 years ago, setting a standard that was not much tougher than what trailer manufacturers already met voluntarily and didn't apply to trailers made before 1998. Last year, the agency studied its own data and found there was no evidence its rules had saved lives. Yet other countries, including Canada, have written tougher requirements over the past several years
To test its research, the institute crashed a 2010 Chevy Malibu at 35 mph into three trailers, one built to U.S. rules, the other two certified to tougher Canadian standards for rear guards. The guard on the U.S.-certified trailer built by Hyundai Translead broke off in the collision, suggesting passengers in a real-world crash would have been decapitated.
Yet in the crash with a Wabash trailer that meets Canadian rules, the guard stayed in place and nothing intruded into the passenger compartment. The IIHS also ran off-set tests, in which all three trailers failed to some degree at keeping the passenger space of the Malibu intact.
The insurers want NHTSA to write a tougher rule for trailers, and apply it to older ones as well as new models. It also wants actual crash tests; the current standard applies only to the guard and its components in pieces, and doesn't test how well it prevents underrides after being installed. As for expense, NHTSA already has an idea on the lifetime costs of maintaining the current guards: just $15 each.
Thanks to Jalopnik for the story
2/28/11
Woman was jogging when she was run over, crushed, and killed by the Kansas City Missouri bus traveling at low speeds
When 12-year-old Jennifer Shockley called her mother about 1:30 p.m. Sunday, her mom sounded like she was in a hurry, so they didnt talk long.
They made plans to spend the following weekend together and hung up.
Less than an hour later, her mother, Kimberly R. Shockley, 48, suffered fatal injuries when she was run over by an Area Transportation Authority bus in midtown.
A witness told police Shockley crossed Linwood Boulevard in front of the bus near Main Street and then tried to get the driver to stop. Police said there was not a bus stop there. The driver saw Shockley cross the street but kept going, police said.
Shockley jogged alongside it for a few moments, pounding her hand on the side, witnesses told police. It was unclear whether the driver knew she was there, police said.
As the bus turned to go north on Main Street, Shockley apparently fell under its front tires. She died at the scene. Police said the bus was traveling about 5 mph.
Police and relatives think Shockley may have wanted a ride to the Redemptorist Church in the 3300 block of Broadway, where her husband was waiting for her.
The driver was placed on routine administrative leave, said Cindy Baker, an ATA spokeswoman. She said she did not know any wreck details but said generally that buses stop only at designated bus stops, for everyones safety.
Shockleys death stunned relatives.
We dont know what happened, said Kimberly Shockleys mother, Shirley Hunt. She was just running after the bus. I just cant believe it.
Hunt said her daughter grew up in Richmond, Mo., the oldest of three daughters, and moved out on her own while still in high school. She later moved to Florida but moved back. She recently landed a job with help from a social services counselor but hadnt started it.
Hunt raised Shockleys two daughters. The youngest, Jennifer, said Monday that her mother was strong and well-loved.
Shockleys oldest daughter, age 24, is expecting a baby. Shockley wanted to spend this weekend with her daughters and Hunt and plan a baby shower.
She had a lot to look forward to, Hunt said. She had a pure heart.
Thanks to the KCSTAR for the story.
2/24/11
Tow truck driver injures mother and three children while driving under the influence
Police in Oxnard say a tow truck driver has been arrested for hitting a mom and her two young children in a stroller as they crossed the street, and then dragging the kids under the truck for about a quarter of a mile.
Oxnard Police Sgt. Randy Latimer says the truck struck 19-year-old Alma Lopez Tuesday morning in a crosswalk, knocking her to the ground.
The truck continued on, dragging the 3-year-old girl and 1-year-old boy and the stroller until witnesses chased and flagged down the driver.
Latimer says the driver was arrested on suspicion of driving his tow truck under the influence of drugs.
The children are hospitalized in critical condition. Their mother's injuries were described as moderate.
2/17/11
The circumstances of the accident - with the 18-wheeler plowing into the rear of the vehicle, suggest that the heavy vehicle's driver may have been distracted by a cell phone call or text messaging.
Our Kansas & Missouri law firm's serious injury and wrongful death lawyers have experience handling 18-wheeler/semi-truck accidents in Kansas and Missouri. Our Kansas City law office's attorneys understand the tremendous forces that come into play in a collision - especially on the highway - between a heavy commercial vehicle and a passenger car.
Semi-truck - passenger vehicle collisions are often due to "distracted driving," which leads to serious injuries, permanent disability, paralyzation, or even death, usually for the occupants of the car or pickup truck. Our Olathe law firm's attorneys regularly subpoena or request truck drivers' cell phone records to see if the driver was on the phone, texting, updating facebook, or otherwise distracted. Evidence of distracted driving can enhance the financial recovery for 18-wheeler crash damages, including lost wages, medical & hospital expenses (future & past), disfigurement, permanent disability, scarring, loss of use, pain, suffering, and the loss of care, comfort, or guidance.
A semi truck crashed into the rear of a slowing car yesterday after noon, leaving three dead in St. Francois County, the Missouri State Highway Patrol reported.
Rachel Sharp, 18, and Aaron Weber, 20, both of Boone Terre, and Frank Weber, 56, of Desoto,were pronounced dead at the scene after the accident on U.S. 67 near St. Francios State Park, according to a highway patrol crash report.
The three were in a 1996 Ford Crown Victoria slowing in the southbound lane when it was struck by the semi truck. Both vehicles traveled off the right side of the roadway, according to the crash report.
2/16/11
Firefighter seriously injured in crash in Kansas City, Missouri
The fire truck hit a car and then crashed into a tree, causing extensive damage and sending the firefighter to the hospital
Fire trucks are extremely large and heavy vehicles, just like other commercial vehicles. As such, they can seriously injure others or their occupants in a collision. In this case, it appears that the collision occurred at an intersection when the car did not properly yield. That crash sent the Kansas City firetruck into a tree, causing the most serious impact.
A Kansas City firefighter injured in a crash Monday afternoon is in serious but stable condition tonight, the department said.
The injured firefighter, Jeff Smith, is a 21-year veteran of the department and serves as a fire apparatus operator. He was behind the wheel when the crash occurred. The other driver received minor injuries, police said.
The pumper truck was headed to a call when it collided with another vehicle and then hit a utility pole about 1:50 p.m. on Red Bridge Road near Barrymore Drive, police said. Telephone wires fell onto the truck.
Rescuers requested extra extrication equipment.
The accident occurred just east of Kansas City Fire Station No. 42, 6006 E. Red Bridge Road, said Joe Vitale, Kansas City Fire Department spokesman.
Police accident investigators were called to investigate.
2/15/11
WICHITA, Kansas Wichita police are making a plea to anyone who may have information about a deadly accident on Kellogg that killed a five-year-old girl Saturday.
Police are still trying to piece together just what happened on Kellogg that left five-year-old Amber Randolph, a Clearwater kindergartener, dead.
Investigators say a pickup going westbound on Kellogg swerved to avoid another vehicle going the same way. Somehow that pickup crossed the median and struck a vehicle with a mother and five-year-old girl inside. Randolph was properly restrained and died at the scene.
The community of Clearwater is doing what it can to come to terms with the loss. School counselors were brought in to help.
"Counselors called all of the parents that have a student in that class," explains Clearwater schools Super intendant Mike Roth, "and allowed them and opportunity to talk with their kids at home prior to showing up today."
Those school administrators say students and teachers alike spent time talking.
"That's the advantage of living in a community like Clearwater," says continues Roth, "is most people look out for each other. There is a true caring sense of what's going on and any time the community loses such a young life. It definitely has an impact on our community."
As for the accident itself, Officers arent sure how fast the pick-up was going or if the driver was possibly racing another vehicle at the time of the crash.
Depending on the outcome of the investigation, exactly what happens, you know we don't know who would be charged, but potentially there could be other charges, said Capt. Max Tenbrook with the Wichita Police Department.
Officers are asking anyone who may have seen the crash to call police, 911, or Crime Stoppers at 267-2111.
Police believe Randolph's 37-year-old mother and the driver of the pickup truck have been released from the hospital. Officials are waiting to release the girls name until school officials can inform their students and parents. They will release the information later this afternoon.
2/14/11
Serious injury caused by semi crash on highway ramp in Wichita, Kansas
Truck driver apparently had trouble negotiating the turn and tipped the tractor-tailer over, resulting in an ambulance ride to the hospital.
WICHITA - One person has been seriously injured in a semi crash on theramp linking eastbound K-96 to eastbound Kellogg this morning,authorities said.
The semi, which was hauling ice cream, crashed while the driver was negotiating the ramp justbefore 6:45 a.m., a Sedgwick County dispatcher said. The crash will keep the ramp closed for several hours.
A 50-year-old man who was a passenger in the semi has been taken to Wesley Medical Center in potentially critical condition, a Kansas Highway Patrol dispatcher said. The driver did not require hospitalization.
The truck was hauling frozen goods, but they did not spill in the crash, the highway patrol dispatcher said.
Thanks to the Wichita Eagle for the story
2/10/11
School bus involved in collision in Kansas City, Missouri
At least one student was injured and treated by emergency crews. No word on whether the students were hospitalized...
It seems like there has been a large number of bus collisions lately. Bus companies are required to comply with "common carrier" laws and regulations which are extensive and specific regarding maintenance for the heavy vehicles, requirements for the vehicle drivers, and rights for the passengers. Our law firm's serious injury & wrongful death lawyers understand these regulations and use them to strengthen our client's cases.
Our Olathe wrongful death law firm has previously represented the family members of persons killed by buses with various vehicle defects, including brake line defects on the heavy commercial vehicle.
A student complained of back pain after a school bus was involved in a wreck this afternoon at 77th Street and Lydia Avenue.
Two students were on the bus when the wreck happened about 4 p.m., police said. They described the wreck as minor.
Another bus wreck was reported about 4:35 p.m. at Independence Avenue and Garfield. Firefighters requested multiple ambulances, though police said the injuries were not life-threatening.
2/8/11
Tractor-trailer swerves into the wrong lane, sideswipes one school bus and crashes head on into another school bus
One person was killed and 17 were injured in the highway collision over a bridge between the 18 wheeler and buses
This collision between a loaded tractor-trailer and TWO school buses could have turned out much, much worse. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's statistics state that "Large trucks accounted for 4 percent of registered vehicles and 8 percent of vehicle miles traveled in 2008 but were involved in 11 percent of all motor vehicle crash deaths and 23 percent of passenger vehicle occupant deaths in multiple-vehicle crashes."
Our Kansas City metro area law firm's personal injury/wrongful death lawyers have handled accidents involving heavy trucks in Kansas and Missouri. The heavy truck crash lawyers in our Olathe, Kansas law office know that large trucks crashes are so deadly simply because of the great difference in the mass of a loaded 18-wheeler or semi-truck compared to a car. Crash protection systems in cars and pickup trucks are simply overwhelmed by the massive forces involved in a commercial vehicle-passenger car collision, which often leads to serious injuries or death to the occupants of the passenger car.
JACKSON, Miss. - A tractor-trailer sideswiped a school bus then collided head-on with a second Tuesday, killing the trucker, a bus driver and a teacher and injuring at least 17 high school students along a rural highway bridge in northern Mississippi, authorities said.
About 60 Ackerman High School seniors had been visiting the campus of the University of Mississippi at Oxford and were returning home aboard the buses on Mississippi highway 8, about 40 miles south of the college.
Students were taken to area hospitals, none with life-threatening injuries, troopers said in a news release. One student was taken by helicopter to North Mississippi Medical Center in Tupelo.
Mike Dunagin, fire chief of Calhoun City near the scene, told The Associated Press that one of the buses smashed up against the guard rail of a highway overpass bridge. Photos showed one bus with its rear half dangling over the guard rail, its hood crumpled and sheered away on the driver's side.
"We're very fortunate the bus didn't go off the bridge," Dunagin said.
The 18-wheeler swerved into the wrong lane and hit the buses, said Mississippi Department of Public Safety spokesman Jon Kalahar.
Killed were trucker Gary T. Bailey, 54, of Mantachie; the driver of the second bus, Steven B. Moss, 37; and Ackerman high teacher Phyllis Graham, 53, of Eupora, highway patrol troopers said. Graham was a passenger on the bus, and Moss also taught and coached at the high school in Choctaw County. The driver of the first bus hit, Shane Burton, 40, of Ackerman, had minor injuries, police said.
Several emergency crews and some pastors to help with counseling were at the scene to assist the shaken students who were some 40 miles from home, said Charlie Brown, a spokesman for the Calhoun City Fire Department.
"Most of them were in total shock," he said of the students.
Thanks to the Wichita Eagle for the story.
2/7/11
Kansas City metro resident injured in hit-and-run accident with a semi-trailer in Overland Park, Kansas
Woman's car was clipped by the 18-wheeler, sending her to the hospital and sending the Kansas Highway Patrol after the tractor-trailer's driver who did not stop following the collision
An Overland Park woman was injured in a hit-and-run accident Sunday morning on U.S. 69 when a tractor-trailer rig changed lanes and struck her car.
The accident occurred at 6:43 a.m. on U.S. 69 at 87th Street. According to a Kansas Highway Patrol crash report, a 2006 Freightliner heading southbound on U.S. 69 made a lane change and struck the front corner of a southbound 1995 Toyota driven by Marilyn Smartwood. The impact forced the car into a concrete barrier.
The tractor-trailer rig continued south on U.S. 69 and was stopped by a trooper in Miami County. The driver, Fausto Mandujano, 44, of Kendall, Texas, told the trooper he didnt know he had struck the car.
Smartwood, 63, was taken to an area hospital. No information on the extent of her injuries was available. Both drivers were wearing seat belts, the Highway Patrol said.
2/5/11
The dump truck/snow plow was traveling to clear slick roads when the accident occurred
I found this article to be very ironic - the dump truck with a blade was sent to clear the highway and ended up crashing on the way. Fortunately, neither person was seriously injured in the heavy truck accident.
FORT WORTH Fort Worth police are working an accident involving a sand truck.
Appropriately enough, it happened on Sandy Lane around 4:45 p.m.
Authorities said the truck slid off the road, turned over on its side and hit a pole, spilling sand on Sandy Lane.
Neither of the heavy truck's two occupants was seriously injured in the accident.
The crew of the sand truck was reportedly responding to reports of slippery roads in the area.
Thanks to wfaa for the story.
2/3/11
Semi-truck driver sentenced for manslaughter for causing accident which killed a mother with two children
18-wheeler Driver was watching movies to keep from falling asleep, became distracted, and crashed into the woman's car, killing her.
An Ohio truck driver whose laptop computer was streaming pornography when his rig hit a disabled car on the New York State Thruway has been sentenced to three-to-nine years in prison for killing the other driver.
Thomas Wallace of Brook Park, Ohio, pleaded guilty in May to second-degree manslaughter. Authorities say he'd slept no more than four of the 27 hours before the Dec. 12 crash that killed Julie Stratton, a 33-year-old mother of two.
The 45-year-old trucker tearfully apologized to the victim's family at Wednesday's sentencing. He had faced five to 15 years in prison.
Stratton hit a deer and her car was disabled in the passing lane shortly before Wallace's tractor-trailer ran into it from behind in Pembroke, 20 miles east of Buffalo.
Information from: The Buffalo News, http://www.buffalonews.com
2/1/11
Tractor-trailer driver injuries man after confrontation
No word on whether the man suffered injuries or required a trip to the hospital due to the incident
ROLLINSFORD, N.H. -- A truck driver from Georgia has been accused of attacking and injuring a Rollinsford homeowner after making a wrong turn and pulling into the homeowner's driveway.
Rollinsford police said Darrell Tanner, 34, of Jonesboro, Ga., was charged with assault after his arrest Monday. They said he made a wrong turn and then pulled into David Arkwell's driveway on Somersworth Road to try to turn around.Arkwell, 55, said he and his son yelled at the driver to back the truck out and stay off their lawn.
"When we were standing there telling him, 'You're not backing on the lawn,' I mean, he was just lost," Arkwell said. "He didn't know what to do."Arkwell said it was clear Tanner became frustrated as he tried to maneuver the tractor-trailer."You probably don't want to know what I said," Arkwell said. "'Get it out of here!" and just the more he tried to back it out, the more frustrated he got."Arkwell, a former truck driver himself, said it was raining at the time, and he didn't want his lawn damaged."I told him at one point, I said, 'If you go on that lawn, I'm calling the cops,'" Arkwell said.The family said this isn't the first time large rigs have turned around in their driveway. Arkwell said he's had to deal with ruts cut into his lawn before.But police said Tanner became so angry that he jumped onto Arkwell from the truck's cab.
"The guy puts it in park, does kind of a Superman out of the cab of the truck and lands right on the resident," said Officer John Baker."Yeah, he just flipped the cab door open and, just, screaming like a mad man, and he just jumped out," Arkwell said. "He never even stepped on the tank, just jumped out of the cab like Superman."According to court documents, Tanner weighs about 434 pounds. Arkwell said he now has a fractured and severely dislocated right shoulder. He said Tanner continued to hit him and then assaulted his adult son."(Tanner) said he just got frustrated and just lost his temper," Baker said.
Tanner declined News 9's request for an interview. Police said he told them he was frustrated after getting lost during a long drive from Georgia to North Berwick, Maine.
1/25/11
The truck driver was working an accident and ended up in the hospital with serious and life threatening injuries. The drunk driver was charged and jailed on a large bond.
St. Louis, MO (KSDK) - A local tow truck operator remains in stable condition after being struck by a suspected drunk driver Tuesday afternoon.
According to Katie O'Sullivan, a spokeswoman for the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department, the accident occurred at 1:50 a.m. in the 4500 block of Gravois Avenue, near Taft Avenue.
The tow truck driver, a 50-year-old man, was loading a vehicle onto his truck when another car passed by and hit him. The tow truck driver was rushed to the hospital, O'Sullivan said.
The driver of the car, identified as 29-year-old Adam Bortscheller, was taken into custody on suspicion of DWI. The St. Louis Circuit Attorney's Office charged Bortscheller with second-degree assault and operating a vehicle while intoxicated resulting in injury.
Bortscheller remains jailed on $30,000 bond.
Thanks to KSDK for the story
1/24/11
Fast moving semi-trailer/18-wheeler carrying 700 pigs loses control and overturns at 435 & I-35 interchange in Kansas City
The heavy truck accident backed up traffic for hours, no people were injured, but the pigs did not fare so well - several of them were killed.
Our Kansas City metro area law firm has evaluated and handled numerous collisions or crashes involving semi-trailers, tractor-double-trailers, and other heavy commercial vehicles. Our truck accident lawyers often notice that truck accidents are caused by defective equipment on the truck (or on the trailers) or due to the truck driver's negligence.
This accident appears to be the result of a driver simply traveling too fast. Heavy trucks, such as semi-trailers loaded with livestock, are very top heavy and will overturn if the truck driver is not careful. Thankfully no people were seriously injured or killed in this semi accident.
The Northland highway ramp that closed after a semi trailer carrying more than 700 pigs overturned has reopened this afternoon.
The ramp from northbound Interstate 435 to northbound Interstate 35 reopened about 1:50 p.m. after being closed for several hours.
About three dozen pigs got loose when the semi crashed about 8:30 a.m., according to Sgt. Collin Stosberg, a spokesman for the Missouri Highway Patrol.
The tractor-trailer was traveling too fast for the curve and lost control, went off the roadway and overturned onto its left side, Stosberg said.
The semi from Heath Cluck Trucking out of Highland, Kan., was hauling about 700 pigs.
Thirty-five to 40 of those were able to get loose and they were corralled at the scene, Stosberg said. The driver was not injured. There were several hogs that were injured.
A veterinarian from Olathe treated the injured pigs. Several pigs were killed in the crash, Stosberg said.
The ramp remained closed while the pigs were transferred onto another truck and the overturned truck was removed.
1/23/11
Kansas City, Missouri driver seriously injured after falling asleep and hitting a semi-trailer head-on on US-59 in Missouri
It appears the heavy truck driver was not at fault in this collision which could have easily been fatal.
A man who was taken to Heartland Regional Medical Center by medical helicopter Thursday night with serious injuries following a car crash is now in fair condition.
Identified by the Missouri State Highway Patrol as Cory E. Stahl of Kansas City, his injuries were classified as serious by the Highway Patrol at the scene. Heartland spokeswoman Marcy George said his condition was listed as fair around 9 a.m. on Friday.
Mr. Stahl had to be extricated from his car after falling asleep at the wheel on U.S. Highway 59, crossing the center line and hitting an oncoming tractor-trailer head-on.
The accident occurred around 7 p.m. Thursday.Mr. Stahl suffered extensive injuries to his lower limbs, including several broken bones. The driver of the truck, Jeff St. Onge of Yellville, Ark., was not injured.Mr. Stahls car was totaled and Mr. St. Onges Peterbilt semitrailer sustained moderate damage.
Thanks to Newspressnow for the story
1/21/11
Snow and ice lead to numerous accidents, including one involving a heavy truck
Ice-covered roadways in Cowley County caused at least six traffic accidents Wednesday evening, according to reports from the sheriffs office and the Kansas Highway Patrol.
We had four accidents and the KHP worked two, said Cowley County Undersheriff Bill Mueller. And there were quite a few spinoffs and slide-offs with no damage there were about a dozen of those. Most of them were north and east of Winfield.
Three of the accidents resulted in injury, the most serious involving an 80-year-old Belle Plaine man who lost control of his vehicle on U.S. 166 about five miles west of Cedar Vale.
Kenneth Stinnett remained in stable condition this morning at the Sedan City Hospital.
According to the KHP, Stinnett was driving his 1991 Ford Ranger westbound when it left the roadway and slid into the ditch about 8:30 p.m.
Also in an accident handled by the KHP, a Derby couple sustained minor injuries in a one-vehicle mishap on U.S. 77, five miles north of Winfield.
Jon, 47, and Sheri Trujillo, 38, were treated and released at William Newton Hospital after their vehicle, a 2002 Jeep SUV driven southbound by Jon, lost control, skidded into the ditch and struck a tree about 10:45 p.m.
And, in an accident reported by the sheriffs office, a 66-year-old Winfield woman incurred minor injuries but was not transported to the hospital.
Catherine Mooney was a passenger in a 2003 Pontiac van driven by James Mooney, 80, of Winfield, who attempted to pass a semitrailer, lost control on the ice and struck an oncoming vehicle near Bolack Corner on U.S. 160.
Read the full story in Thursday's edition of The Winfield Daily Courier or subscribe to the e-edition at http://www.winfieldcourier.com/edition
1/13/11
Semi-trailer hit by car slowing down for a different accident
This accident goes to show that drivers of cars, trucks, and heavy trucks need to be extra careful in snow and ice.
Inertia is a prime factor in the difference in braking distance between a car and a heavy truck. A fully loaded semi truck has the gross vehicle weight, depending on its cargo, of up to 80,000 pounds. (Compare this to an average car's weight of 4,000 pounds.) At a speed of 55 m.p.h., a semi truck's stopping distance is 100 yards--the length of a football field. A mid-size automobile traveling at the same speed can stop within half of that distance. Our law firm's 18-wheeler accident lawyers understand the physics involved in heavy truck/passenger vehicle collisions and we use that knowledge to prove our personal injury/wrongful death clients' cases..
COLBY -- Snowy road conditions were blamed for two vehicle crashes in succession on Interstate Highway 70 near Colby Sunday afternoon, the Kansas Highway Patrol reported.
The first crash happened at 3:46 p.m. about 81/2 miles east of Colby. A car driven by John Mbugua Wanjigi, 27, Wichita, went out of control, crossed the median and struck a second car that was traveling west. The driver of the second car was Steven R. Barnes, 65, Marietta, Ga.
Wanjigi was taken to Citizens Medical Center in Colby. Barnes wasn't hurt.
The second crash happened about a minute later. A car traveling west on I-70 slowed due to the previous crash and collided with a semitrailer.
The car was driven Zachariah Guthis Bates, 32, St. Louis. He was taken to Citzens Medical Center in Colby for treatment. The semi was driven by James J. King, 49, of Thomaston, Ga. King wasn't hurt.
A hospital representative said Monday that both Wanjigi and Bates were released after treatment.
Thanks to the Salina Journal for the story
1/12/11
Overloaded snow plow falls through concrete while clearing snow
Fortunately, no injuries or deaths were reported as a result of this snow plow accident.
The lawyers in our Kansas and Missouri wrongful death/personal injury law firm handled commercial vehicle/heavy truck cases where it was clear that the Department of Transportation's guidelines were not being followed. "Cutting corners" to save time or money often leads to deaths or injuries. While no one was injured by this snow plow, it goes to show that, when dealing with such heavy vehicles, proper planning is vitally important.
See the video in our video gallery
1/11/11
Kansas Highway Patrol Trooper injured in a collision with an 18-wheeler in Olathe, Johnson County, KS
Speeding semi-trailer car hauler lost control, hitting a minivan and pushing that vehicle into the Trooper, who was working a different accident
This car-truck accident is another example of a tractor-trailer being unable to stop in the distance that passenger vehicles can. Our law firm's truck lawyers understand that the tremendous weight of heavy trucks prevents them from stopping in any reasonable amount of time/distance. These stopping distances mean that a 18-wheeler collision will often push the car considerable distances, leading to serious injuries or fatalities.
OLATHE, Kan. -- A Kansas State Highway Patrol trooper was one of two people injured in a semi-trailer crash Monday afternoon near Olathe.
The semi, which was hauling minivans, was involved in a crash with a minivan at about 3:30 p.m. Monday in the northbound lanes of Interstate 35 near Lone Elm Road, police said. The trooper was attending to another vehicle when the semi wreck pushed into that accident and the trooper was injured, police said.
A fire captain said the two victims were taken to the hospital with minor injuries. The exit to Lone Elm Road was closed for a time and traffic was limited to one lane on northbound I-35 during the afternoon rush hour.
Thanks to KCTV5 for the story
1/10/11
Missouri woman killed in collision with a heavy truck in rural Missouri
The enormous mass of commercial vehicles often proves deadly when they collide with smaller and lighter passenger cars and trucks
Passenger cars and commercial vehicles share the road throughout Kansas and Missouri which puts drivers in great peril, especially along highways such as I-70 where it seems like the truck drivers take great risks in an effort to save time.
When passenger cars and 18-wheelers or other commercial vehicles are involved in accidents, the folks in the car seldom fare well. Our law firm's commercial vehicle lawyers have encountered numerous instances where a tractor-trailer is barely damaged in a collision, but the occupants of the car are killed or seriously injured.
A 62-year-old Butler, Mo., woman was killed when the car she was in collided head-on with a tractor-trailer in Henry County.
Mary E. Bashor was killed in the crash that occurred about 10:30 a.m. Monday just west of Route Ra along Missouri 18, west of Clinton, Mo., according to the Missouri Highway Patrol.
Ronald L. Bashor, who was driving, was seriously injured in the crash.
The two were eastbound on Missouri 18 when their vehicle crossed into the path of an oncoming tractor-trailer. Mary Bashor was pronounced dead at the scene. The driver of the tractor-trailer was not injured.
All three people were wearing seatbelts, according to the highway patrol.
1/7/11
Trailer detaches from truck and causes a pileup and serious injuries on K-10 in Johnson County, Kansas
This story shows the importance of securing loads and making sure that all equipment is working properly when pulling a trailer, especially on busy highways.
This story vividly demonstrates the hazards of pulling a trailer that is not properly connected or maintained. A detached trailer is simply a missile waiting to destroy a car and injure or kill its occupants. This is especially true on a busy highway, such as K-10, which is full of commuters traveling to and from Eudora, Basehor, DeSoto, and Lawrence, and college students traveling to and from Lawrence.
Our Olathe personal injury law firm has investigated and successfully pursued wrongful death and personal injury claims on Kansas and Missouri highways, including I-35, I70, 435, and throughout Johnson County and Kansas City.
Two people were hurt this afternoon in a three-vehicle crash on Kansas 10 caused by a detached trailer.
The crash occurred about 3:45 p.m. near Lexington Avenue, closing the westbound lanes of K-10 near De Soto.
The Johnson County sheriffs office just reported that the highway has reopened.
The crash occurred when a 16-foot trailer unhitched from a truck traveling eastbound on K-10. The trailer crossed the median, striking two other vehicles traveling westbound.
A man driving one of the vehicles was seriously hurt and taken to an area hospital. A woman driving the other vehicle suffered minor injuries.
12/30/10
Missouri woman killed after her vehicle is struck by a tractor-trailer on US-71 in Missouri
Heavy trucks are unable to stop quickly in the best of conditions, meaning truck drivers must take care to scan the road and avoid collisions that will often turn deadly.
Our Kansas City area law firm's staff and attorneys have dealt with similar cases where a truck hits a passenger car or truck that is in peril, causing serious injuries or death to the occupants of the car. Truck drivers can be considered negligent if they are driving in a manner which will not allow them to stop in time to avoid a collision with a disable passenger car, even if that car was disabled by another, unrelated collision.
A 27-year-old Butler, Mo., woman has died after she was involved in a crash and then her overturned vehicle was struck by a semi-tractor trailer.
Jessica L. Evans died at the hospital from injuries suffered in the two crashes.
The crashes occurred a minute apart about 7:05 p.m. Tuesday along U.S. 71 just north of Archie, Mo.
Evans was driving a 2003 Chevrolet south on U.S. 71 when she collided with a 1994 Pontiac driven Carl W. Joyce, 20, of Overland Park, according to the Missouri Highway Patrol.
Evans car went off the left side of the road, overturned and came to rest in the left lane of northbound U.S. 71. Joyces vehicle also traveled off the left side of the road, but came to rest in the median, according to highway patrol.
A northbound 1997 Kenworth, driven by William R. Denby, then struck Evans car, which had become disabled in the roadway from the previous crash, according to highway patrol.
Evans was flown to a Kansas City hospital where she died from her injuries. Joyce suffered minor injuries and was taken to a hospital by a private vehicle. Denby was uninjured.
Evans car was totaled and the semi had extensive damage.
All three people involved in the two crashes were wearing safety belts.