Roughly one third of Division I NCAA university sports programs have used charter buses from companies with deficient safety records, according to a report by Paula Lavigne of ESPN. The number of smaller college and high school teams traveling in buses with safety problems is undoubtedly much higher. Recently, I’ve…
A truck loaded with 32,000 pounds of pressurized hydrofluoric acid overturned in Wind Gap, Pennsylvania, at 2:58 AM Saturday morning, prompting evacuation of everyone within a one mile radius. The truck was operated by Honeywell, the worlds largest producer of hydrofluoric acid. Reportedly, the trucker from Ontario, Canada, left the…
Not surprisingly, the “safety culture” of a trucking company is a huge factor in determining whether its drivers are involved in catastrophic truck crashes. The Transportation Research Board published a couple of years ago “The Role of Safety Culture in Preventing Commercial Motor Vehicle Crashes.” Some key points from that…
As a trucking safety trial attorney in Atlanta, Georgia, and engaged with attorneys handling these cases from coast to coast, I try to keep up with the continuing shell game as the folks responsible for putting truckers on the road and pushing them often beyond both the rules and their…
Corporate shell games to avoid accountability for injuring or killing people are all too common. We see it an a variety of contexts. Today I got an email outlining how attorneys for nursing homes are directing their clients to lower their insurance coverage to $100,000 and set up an intricate…
Today in Bartow, Florida, a jury returned a $65 million verdict — all compensatory damages, no punitives — in a truck crash case against Bynum Transport. I understand the case involved a stop light collision with contested liability. The damage award was apparently all to fund a huge life care…
A fatal truck crash in the Philadelphia area involved such egregious safety violations that vehicular homicide charges have been brought against: – The driver. He had been ordered to be taken out of service on four of six compliance checks since June due to faulty brakes and a falsified log-book.…
When you or a loved one have been badly hurt in a catastrophic trucking accident, you may expect someone from the trucking company or its insurer to try to lull you into complacency. The objective is to avoid paying the value of the case, which they recognize is substantial. The…
President Obama has signed legislation killing the Transportation Department’s controversial test of longhaul cross-border trucking with Mexico. As a trucking safety trial attorney in Atlanta, Georgia, I haven’t yet seen problems with Mexican truckers but I do see truckers who don’t speak English although adequate English proficiency is required under…
Truck driver fatigue is one of the most obvious causes of truck crashes. Obstructive sleep apnea is among the most common contributing factors. Obesity is a big risk factor for obstructive sleep apnea. Now there is another study reconfirming the obvious: that obesity-driven testing strategies identify commercial truck drivers with…