Trucking Accidents

Garbage Truck Collisions and Other Refuse Collection Accidents

July 24, 2015 | Gregory J. Brod

They blend into the everyday hubbub on streets throughout America, fitting in seamlessly because they visit most of our homes on a weekly basis. This normalcy makes it easy to forget that they are actually powerful, heavy-duty vehicles. Our Oakland truck accident lawyer knows that garbage truck accidents are a problem few of us ever consider – until it happens in our neighborhood or until an accident impacts someone we love.

Officials Investigate Garbage Truck Accident in Orinda, CA

A garbage truck accident in Orinda on Tuesday left many feeling grateful that the outcome wasn’t more tragic. The Oakland Tribune reports that a garbage worker was preparing a bin for loading on Los Ceros just before 8 A.M. when the truck began to roll backwards down a hill towards the busy Moraga Way. The worker gave chase and tried to jump into the driver’s seat but wasn’t able to hold on and eventually leapt off the truck. After colliding with a single car, the truck came to a stop. Both the worker and the car’s driver were hospitalized but officials say they expect both people to recover fully. Local police chief Mark Nagel remarked that it is amazing the consequences weren’t more severe. An investigation is ongoing to determine why the truck began to roll.

Back to the Basics – Accidents and Employer Liability

June 3, 2015 | Gregory J. Brod

According to the Washington Post, comedian Tracy Morgan has reached a settlement with Wal-Mart after last year’s accident. In June of last year, Mr. Morgan was in a limo bus on the New Jersey Turnpike that was rear-ended by a WalMart tractor-trailer. The accident killed one passenger in the bus – comedy writer James McNair – and left Mr. Morgan with broken bones among other injuries. Mr. Morgan filed a personal injury suit against Wal-Mart in July, and Wal-Mart had originally attempted to avoid liability by claiming that Mr. Morgan was not wearing a seat belt. The driver of the tractor-trailer, who was employed by Wal-Mart, had not slept for over 24 hours before the accident.

Employer Liability

In Tracy Morgan’s lawsuit, Wal-Mart’s liability was asserted based on the doctrine of Respondeat Superior. Respondeat Superior is a legal theory that allows for an employer to be held liable or responsible for the tortious acts of an employee, if the employee’s acts within the scope of their employment.

Holding Trucking Companies Responsible When Mechanical Issues Lead to Tragic Crashes

March 27, 2015 | Gregory J. Brod

Large trucks have the potential to cause terrible accidents. Whether the victim is an employee or a bystander, large truck accidents are frightening and tragic. The tragedy of a truck-related fatality is compounded when the investigation reveals that the incident could have been prevented. Maintenance failures are a major cause of preventable trucking accidents. Although we cannot turn back the clock, our Oakland truck accident law firm is committed to holding companies responsible when their actions (or inaction) leads to a preventable tragedy.

Mechanical Issues Eyed in Fatal Pittsburg Truck Crash On Monday March 16, a big rig truck slammed into a Pittsburg restaurant killing the driver. An investigation by ABC7 News suggests maintenance issues may have led to the incident. ABC 7 learned that Roby Trucking, the company that owns the truck involved in the accident, has received numerous violation notices from the California Highway Patrol (“CHP”). The records show a long history of problems involving safety and maintenance including issues with steering, brake, and other mechanical systems. A CHP inspection last fall found the company had an unsatisfactory performance in all categories. Two examples of problems noted in CHP records include a big rig driven despite a missing lug nut and another overloaded by 16,000 pounds.

The possibility that a mechanical failure led to the Pittsburg tragedy doesn’t seem to have come as a surprise to some current and former employees of Roby Trucking. An employee who spoke anonymously told reporters that he has seen a wide range of maintenance problems on company trucks including problems with the brakes, tires, and oil lines. Another individual, a former office manager with the company, said “It was about money. It was always about money. It was never about safety. It wasn’t about their drivers. It wasn’t about the public.”

Oakland Injury Attorney Examines the Threat of Rental Truck Accidents

February 18, 2015 | Gregory J. Brod

Whether it is to facilitate a do-it-yourself move, to haul equipment for a landscaping project, or for some other transport need, many of us will rent a truck at some point in our lives. Rental companies often tout the ease of driving these vehicles, assuring prospective customers that they can handle the task of driving even if the largest vehicle they’ve piloted in the past is a mini-van or SUV. Still, renters and everyone else on the road are relying on the rental company to provide a safe vehicle. Rental truck accidents happen for a range of reasons. In today’s post, our Oakland rental truck accident lawyer explores these accidents, specifically the dangers that negligent upkeep or other vehicle-related problems pose to all travelers.

Rental Truck Accident in San Jose Early Tuesday morning, according to a report in the Oakland Tribune, a rental truck accident halted traffic on Highway 101 South between Brokaw Road and First Street in San Jose for one hour. CHP Officer Ross Lee told reporters that a rental truck swerved off the road onto the right shoulder and plowed into a chain-link fence. With the fence wrapped around the driveline and rear axle, the truck proceeded to head left, driving through a guardrail and crossing all four lanes of traffic with the fence in tow. Luckily, the driver was not injured and, likely thanks to the early hour, no other vehicles were involved. The cause of the incident remained undetermined at the time of the report, although the CHP noted they did not suspect drug or alcohol use.

Report Examines Rental Truck Safety Following Fatal Accident The accident in San Jose could have had a much more tragic ending, a truth brought home by a November 2011 report in the Hartford Courant. The report followed a crash in which a rental truck driven by a Yale student hauling beer kegs to a football tailgate plowed into a group of pedestrians killing one woman and injuring two others. Although the article preceded an investigation, the author suggests the accident would likely add to the controversy over rental truck policies nationwide, policies that put untrained drivers at the helm of 5-ton vehicles despite few maintenance requirements.

Commercial Truck Accidents and Legal Liability: Who’s Responsible When Trucks Cause Injuries?

December 16, 2014 | Gregory J. Brod

Responsibility. It is one of the most important values we can pass on to our children. As children grow into young adults, it becomes increasingly clear that responsibility is at once a simple concept and a quite complex one. If you didn’t stop a friend from driving drunk and the friend causes a crash, are you responsible? If your boss tells you to deliver the pizza within ten minutes and you speed to get there, are you responsible, is your boss, or are you both? In today’s post, our San Francisco injury law firm looks at one small segment of this issue from one particular vantage point: truck accidents and legal responsibility.

Semi-Truck Involved in Five Car Pileup

Authorities are trying to determine what caused a multi-vehicle accident in San Francisco this past Saturday afternoon. Per the San Francisco Chronicle, the unidentified driver of a semi-truck suffered life threatening injuries after colliding with one vehicle and crashing into three parked cars before hitting a building located at 21st and Guerero. A second person was also injured in the incident. The Chronicle reports that photographs on social media sites show the truck bore a Safeway logo.

The Dangerous Intersection of Drowsy Driving and Big Rig Accidents

October 17, 2014 | Gregory J. Brod

Few among us haven’t experienced it, you feel your eyes get heavy and begin to close only to startle yourself back to reality; a moment of extreme fatigue that is extremely frightening when it happens while you’re behind the wheel. In modern America, being sleep deprived seems to be the norm and it is frightening to consider how many drowsy drivers are travelling at any given moment. Drowsy driving becomes even more frightening when the tired driver is at the wheel of a big rig truck. For too long, companies have incentivized drivers to push the limits and log as many hours as they can fit in a day. Our Oakland drowsy driving law firm represents those injured in accidents caused by drowsy truck drivers and also supports efforts to prevent truck drivers from driving while fatigued.

Truck Overturns in Vallejo, Driver Reports Fatigue Was Key Factor

On Tuesday morning, as ABC7 reports, a box truck overturned in Vallejo along I-80 West near the state Highway 37 overpass. Truck driver Jesus Osegura, age 24 of Sacramento, told the California Highway Patrol that he had been falling asleep and nearly collided with the back of another truck. Osegura made a sudden, abrupt turn to avoid the collision, causing the load to shift and the truck to overturn. CHP officers report that Osegura was able to climb out of the overturned vehicle but noted neck and leg pain. The incident occurred around 3 A.M.

Hit-and-Run Crash in Fremont Between Truck and Motorcyclist Leaves Latter Dead and Unanswered Questions

October 9, 2014 | Gregory J. Brod

The brunt of a crash between a truck and smaller motor vehicle almost invariably falls most heavily on the latter, with the odds of survival or escaping injury for the motorist much poorer than those for the trucker. However, a collision between a truck and a motorcyclist, bicyclist or pedestrian is even more heavily stacked against the nontrucking party, with the chances for a fatal encounter for the latter greatly increased. And San Francisco motorcycle accident and trucking accident attorney Gregory J. Brod notes with sadness that a hit-and-run collision between a truck and motorcycle in Fremont on Wednesday left the motorcyclist dead and the truck driver nowhere to be found.

According to KTVU News, a 61-year-old man riding his motorcycle eastbound toward Warm Springs Boulevard on Mission Boulevard, which is a busy road that connects Interstates 880 and 680, was struck and killed by a semi-rig at about 1:15 p.m. Wednesday. Witnesses reported that the driver of the truck, which may have been towing two chrome-colored tanks, continued on without stopping after hitting the 2004 Kawasaki motorcycle.

The California Highway Patrol has identified the deceased motorcyclist but was not releasing his name until his family is notified. The CHP said that it is possible the trucker did not realize that he or she had struck the motorcycle, and that the collision occurred on a stretch of the road that is under construction, which elevated the hazardous conditions on the busy street.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration‘s most recent statistics paint a grim picture for motorcyclists involved in crashes, including the following:

In 2012, 4,957 motorcyclists were killed in motor vehicle traffic crashes, which represents a 7 percent increase from the 4,630 motorcyclists who were killed in 2011.
In 2012, there were 93,000 motorcyclists who were injured, which is a 15 percent increase from the 81,000 who were injured in 2011.
In 2012, motorcyclists accounted for 15 percent of all traffic fatalities and 18 percent of all occupant (driver and passenger) fatalities.
While motorcycles represented only 3 percent of all registered vehicles in the United States in 2012 and accounted for only 0.07 percent of all vehicle miles traveled, on a per-vehicle-mile-traveled basis, they were 26 times more likely than passenger car occupants to die in traffic crashes and five times more likely to be injured
On a per-registered-vehicle basis, the fatality rate for motorcyclists was six times the rate for passenger car occupants in 2012, while the injury rates for motorcyclists and passenger car occupants were about the same.
In 2012, 2,624, or 52 percent, of all motorcycles involved in fatal crashes collided with another motor vehicle.

In addition, the NHTSA‘s most recent statistics on trucking crashes sketch an ominous picture for motor vehicles that are unfortunate enough to be involved in a collision with a truck, including the following:

In 2012, 3,921 people died and another 104,000 were injured in crashes involving large trucks – those with a gross vehicle weight rating greater than 10,000 pounds – 333,000 of which were involved in traffic crashes that year.
The 3,921 fatalities from crashes involving large trucks in 2012 represented a 4 percent increase from the 3,781 who died the year before.
Of the trucking-linked fatalities in 2012, 73 percent were occupants of other vehicles, 10 percent were non-occupants, and only 18 percent were occupants of large trucks.
In 2012, 104,000 people were injured in crashes involving large trucks, which represents an 18 percent increase from the 88,000 who were injured in 2011.
Of the trucking-linked injuries in 2012, 73 percent were occupants of other vehicles, 3 percent were non-occupants, and only 24 percent were occupants of large trucks.
In 2012, large trucks accounted for 4 percent of all registered vehicles, 9 percent of the total vehicle miles traveled, and 8 percent of all vehicles involved in fatal crashes.

Sentencing in Sonoma Puts Spotlight on Underreported Problem of Drowsy Driving

September 25, 2014 | Gregory J. Brod

There are a variety of perils that face motorists and others who use roadways, including unsafe road conditions, reckless or drunken drivers, defective vehicles, etc. One factor or circumstance that San Francisco trucking accident attorney Gregory J. Brod would point out often goes unreported is when a driver is impaired because of insufficient sleep. And one truck driver’s sentencing in Sonoma County on Monday refocused attention on the dangers of drowsy driving.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Daniel James Armstrong Rauer, 28, of Rohnert Park, had pleaded no contest in August to misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter in the death of Benny White, 66, of Sonoma. Rauer was the bakery truck driver who fell asleep at the wheel and crashed head-on with the pickup truck that White was driving, killing White. On Monday, a Sonoma County Superior Court judge sentenced Rauer to five years of probation and 500 hours of community service, which is slated to include raising public awareness about the perils of fatigued driving.

The problem of fatigued driving is a very serious, though often underreported, problem. Drowsy driving precipitates more than 100,000 crashes every year in the United States, which result in 40,000 injuries and 1,550 fatalities, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Those figures may be on the conservative side because it is difficult to attribute many accidents to sleepiness.

Rauer told investigators that he had just started his new job and was adjusting to its nighttime-shift schedule when the collision occurred. That fact and a few others in his case dovetail with some of the other cofactors that are often present in cases involving fatigued driving, including these compiled by the National Sleep Foundation:

Compared with other age groups, those adults age 18-29 are more likely, 71 percent more likely to be precise, to drive while drowsy.
Workers on a shift-based schedule are more likely than those with regular daytime work schedules to drive drowsy to and from work at least a few days per month, with the comparative percentages 36 percent for the former versus 25 percent for the latter.
The less people sleep, the greater the risk that they will be involved in a crash. The impact of sleep deprivation escalates the less time a driver has devoted to sleeping prior to driving, with people who sleep six or seven hours a night twice as likely to be involved in a crash as those sleeping eight hours or more; people who sleep less than five hours per night are four to five times more likely to be involved in a collision.

Driving without the benefit of a good night’s sleep has been compared to driving while under the influence of alcohol. Indeed, an Australian study found that motorists who are awake for more than 18 hours experience an impairment equivalent to a blood alcohol level of .05, which increases to a BAC of .10 after 24 hours. A motorist with a BAC of .08 is considered legally drunk in the United States.

Driver fatigue may have been a factor in several high-profile crashes, including at least two this year: the deadly collision on April 11 when a FexEx truck collided with a tour bus loaded with high school students near Orland in the Central Valley, killing 10 and injuring 30; the collision of a Wal-Mart truck with a limousine carrying comedian Tracy Morgan on the New Jersey Turnpike in June, which killed another passenger and left Morgan severely injured.
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Much Remains to Be Determined in Deadly Santa Clara County Trucking Accident

July 11, 2014 | Gregory J. Brod

When a big rig collided with 10 vehicles on northbound Highway 17 near the Lexington Reservoir in Santa Clara County on Thursday the result was a horrific scene in which one person died and seven others were sent to the hospital. And San Francisco trucking accident attorney Gregory J. Brod would point out that tragedy not only left behind much death, injury and destruction, but also several questions regarding how the multi-vehicle crash could have occurred as well as the matter of liability.

According to the San Jose Mercury News, a big rig was traveling just south of Bear Creek Road when, a witness reported, traffic came almost to a standstill near the reservoir and the truck “rolled over everything in its path.” As a result, a 25-year-old San Jose State graduate from Santa Cruz who was driving one of the vehicles caught in the mash-up died after he was ejected from his car. In addition, seven other people in the remaining nine vehicles were sent to area hospitals with injuries, with one listed in critical condition and the others sustaining minor to moderate injuries. The California Highway Patrol did not arrest or cite the driver of the big rig and has determined that he was not intoxicated at the time of the crash. The CHP said that investigators do not yet know what caused the crash.

Thel National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reports that there has been an increase in the number of traffic fatalities involving trucks in the United States, with such deaths going up by 3.7 percent from 2011 to 2012 alone. And, as the nation has grown increasingly dependant on truck traffic for shipping goods, the number of accidents overall involving trucks has steadily increased.

Whenever there is a trucking accident, the questions of what caused the collision and who is responsible often go beyond the obvious on-the-road participants – unfortunately, in Thursday’s tragedy, the number of people who were directly impacted by the crash was on the high end. Barring any fault placed upon the drivers of passenger vehicles involved in a crash with a truck, if the focus of fault hovers over the truck driver, there are other key parties who may be judged responsible for victims’ injuries aside from the truck driver, including:

the owner of the truck;
the person or company that leased the truck from the owner;
the manufacturer of the vehicle, tires or other truck parts that may have played a role in the cause or severity of the accident; and
the shipper or loader of the truck’s cargo in those cases that involve improper loading.

As Trucking Accidents Have Gone Up, Authorities Seek Answers in Crash with Bus

April 11, 2014 | Gregory J. Brod

It was supposed to be a get-acquainted trip for students from Southern California who had been accepted at Humboldt State University. But the bus trip to the Northern California college turned deadly on Interstate 5 near the Glenn County town of Orland on Thursday when a FedEx tractor-trailer crossed the grassy center divider, slammed into the chartered vehicle, and created a fireball that resulted in 10 deaths and dozens of injuries. The horrific collision has San Francisco trucking accident attorney Gregory J. Brod noting that the tragedy took place in the midst of an upswing in accidents involving trucks in California.

According to The New York Times, state authorities have said that it could take months to determine what caused the driver of the FedEx truck to cross over the divider and hit the bus, a collision that took the lives of five of the students on board among the 10 deceased that included the drivers of both vehicles; 31 more passengers were taken to seven hospitals. In the chaotic scene that unfolded, panicked children, attempted to flee the bus from its windows or the rear emergency door. Many of the children were limping and bleeding from cuts to their faces.

Meanwhile, the bus and tractor-trailer were engulfed in a huge conflagration from the impact that could be heard from as far as one-quarter mile away, according to Glenn County Sheriff Larry Jones, and the collision resulted in I-5 being shut down on both sides of the highway.

“This was a horrific collision,” said Jones, who is also the county coroner. A fire “with very high temperatures” broke out almost immediately after the impact, he said.
There were 47 people on board the bus, including high school students and their chaperones who were from Southern California school districts, including Los Angeles, Long Beach and Riverside. The high school teens were visiting Humboldt State as part of a spring program for admitted students.

A couple of unsettling factors that investigators will be looking into as to why the driver of the southbound FedEx truck veered out of control before striking the northbound bus will be whether the truck driver fell asleep or whether the truck had mechanical problems. The California Highway Patrol noted that prior to colliding with the bus, the truck sideswiped another vehicle, although the CHP said that it was not immediately clear what role that may have played in the subsequent disaster.

One thing that is clear, unfortunately, is that accidents in California involving commercial trucks have been on the upswing lately, with deadly consequences. According to KTVU News, in 2012 there were 1,015 collisions involving commercial trucks in the state, up from 951 in 2009. Indeed, the crash numbers have been on the rise for the last five years, and fatalities and injuries have also gone up during the same period.

Some of the trucking accidents may have been attributable to improperly maintained vehicles – commercial vehicle license holders are required to properly maintain their trucks in California – or the crashes may have been due to an increased number of trucks on the highway due to an improving economy. But another culprit may have been the pressures of meeting deadlines and longer hauls that may be a contributory factor to driver fatigue, which may have been an issue in the Glenn County crash on Thursday.
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