Georgia Truck Accident Attorney Blog

Published on: May 9, 2010

Trucking safety issues addressed by FMCSA director

As a trucking accident trial attorney based in Atlanta, Georgia, I try to keep up with trucking safety issues at the national level. The latest development was a statement last week by Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration director Ann Ferro at a U.S. Senate subcommittee. Some of the high points include:

Core priorities of FMCSA are to:
1. Raise the safety bar to enter the industry;
2. Require operators to maintain high safety standards to remain 3. Remove high-risk operators from our roads and highways.

CSA 2010 is to be implemented by end of 2010.
This Comprehensive Safety Analysis program is intended to measure seven key behaviors that are linked to trucking crash risk:
1.Unsafe Driving 2. Fatigued Driving 3. Driver Fitness which includes licensing and medical compliance standards 4. Crash History 5. Vehicle Maintenance 6. Improper Loading and Cargo 7. Controlled Substances – Drugs and Alcohol
New Entrant Safety Assurance Program focuses on 16 safety regulations for which a violation by a new entrant carrier would result in an automatic failure of the safety audit. Any new entrant that fails the safety audit must submit a Corrective Action Plan (CAP) in order to continue to operate in interstate commerce. FMCSA also closely monitors the new entrant during the initial 18-month period of operation and, if certain violations are discovered during a roadside inspection, the new entrant will be subject to an expedited action to correct the identified safety deficiencies.

National Registry of Certified Medical Examiners rules later this year will establish minimum training and testing requirements for all healthcare professionals that issue medical certificates for interstate truck and bus drivers. (I’ve seen drivers who were cleared to return to service in a 10 minute checkup by a chiropractor after open heart surgery.)

Hours of Service. FMCSA is taking another look at the controversial hours of service rule.

Electronic On-Board Recorders will be required of an additional 5,700 motor carriers as a remedial measure. (The days of “comic book” driver logs may be numbered, but making the EOBR systems tamper-proof will be the next challenge.)

Distracted Driving. FMCSA has banned text messaging by drivers while operating a commercial motor vehicle. (It’s a step in the right direction.)

Drug & Alcohol Database. FMCSA is working on a database to keep up with drivers who fail drug and alcohol tests.

There’s more. I commend the entire statement to the interested reader.
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Published on: May 7, 2010

DUI tractor trailer driver kills teen in WV

By Ken Shigley

Most professional truck drivers follow the zero tolerance rules about drinking and drugs before driving a tractor trailer or other commercial vehicle. As a trucking safety trial attorney in Atlanta, Georgia, I see a lot of serious safety violations but seldom one involving DUI.

But a recent tragedy in West Virginia demonstrates why there is no tolerance for truck drivers operating an 80,000 pound, 18-wheeler semi tractor trailer truck when impaired by alcohol or drugs. Police there say Breazeale Norris was driving drunk when he hit a car on I-64 in December 2009. One 18-year-old boy died in the crash and three others were injured. Norris was charged with DUI causing death and leaving the scene of an accident.

About 37% of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations deals with alcohol and drug testing procedures.

49 C.F.R. § 392.5 absolutely prohibits use or possession of alcohol in operation of a commercial motor vehicle. “No driver shall . . . [u]se alcohol, . . . or be under the influence of alcohol, within 4 hours before going on duty or operating, or having physical control of, a commercial motor vehicle; or . . . [u]se alcohol, be under the influence of alcohol, or have any measured alcohol concentration or detected presence of alcohol, while on duty, or operating, or in physical control of a commercial motor vehicle.” Any driver is violation of this is placed in “out of service status” for 24 hours.

It further provides that “No motor carrier shall require or permit a driver to . . . [v]iolate any provision [of this section or] [b]e on duty or operate a commercial motor vehicle if, by the driver’s general appearance or conduct or by other substantiating evidence, the driver appears to have used alcohol within the preceding 4 hours.”

49 C.F.R. § 391.15 provides that a driver is disqualified by driving a commercial vehicle with blood alcohol 0.04% or more, or under influence of drugs, or refusing to take drug or alcohol test.
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Published on: May 7, 2010

Tractors trailers loaded with copper stolen, reminds me of my prosecution days

By Ken Shigley

When I saw that three tractor trailers loaded with copper cable had been stolen from Southwire in Carrollton, Georgia, it reminded me of my days as a young prosecutor out in the country. See Steve Wilson’s report in the Times-Georgian for details.

As a young Assistant District Attorney right out of law school, I prosecuted cases of both an 18-wheeler theft and theft of coils of copper cable from a Georgia Power substation construction site, right up the road from Carrollton in Haralson County. The copper theft case was the only time I’ve seen a packed courtroom applaud a jury verdict.

Over the years, whenever copper prices go up, copper thieves steal wire from power stations and transformers for resale on the black market. Sending semi trucks to pick up loads of copper cable directly from the manufacturer, under a fraudulent truck brokerage contract (if that is in fact what happened), is brazenly efficient.
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Published on: May 7, 2010

Greyhound bus runs off I-16 into ditch

By Ken Shigley

Buses are not supposed to run off the road into a ditch. You don’t have to be a truck and bus accident trial attorney, in Georgia or elsewhere, to know that.

Early this morning, a Greyhound bus ran off I-16 in southeast Georgia, westbound about halfway between Macon and Savannah. The driver ran into a ditch and then came back on the roadway, according to law enforcement reports. The driver stopped on the shoulder. Five minor injuries were reported.

The drive up I-16 between Savannah and Macon can be boring. I drive that route often, but have yet to run off the road though there have been times I pulled off at an exit for a power nap. Investigation is likely to focus on driver fatigue and driver distraction as likely causes of the incident.
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Published on: May 6, 2010

Tractor trailer theft ring busted

By Ken Shigley

Most of my work as an Atlanta attorney involves serious injuries and deaths due to truck wrecks around Georgia and the Southeast — tractor trailers, big rigs, dump trucks, concrete mixer trucks, delivery trucks, mobile cranes, etc.

But my first truck-related trial, many years ago, was when I was an Assistant District Attorney in a rural Georgia circuit. It involved the theft of a tractor trailer and its cargo, and was related to thefts of fuel from a pipeline that passed through a small town. Most of the city fathers were implicated in the overall plot which was prosecuted in federal court. However, the feds bumped the tractor trailer hijacking back down to our state prosecution team.

This week there is a news story that reminds me of that long-ago prosecution. In Missouri, law enforcement officers have broken up a tractor trailer theft ring and recovered six semi-tractors and eight semi-trailers stolen in Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma and Maryland. Some young Assistant DA is going to have fun with that case.
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Published on: May 6, 2010

Tractor trailer driver on cell phone before crash that killed eleven

By Ken Shigley

When a tractor trailer crashed into a passenger van in March, killing 11 Mennonites en route to a wedding, the truck driver from Alabama had been continually on his cell phone and speeding up to 80 mph, according to the Kentucky State Police report.

Right now I’m working on a brief opposing a motion to exclude my expert witness from testifying about cell phone distraction in driving. I am scheduled to speak on driver distraction in trucking at the American Association for Justice convention in Vancouver this July. The Kentucky crash provides more material for that presentation.
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Published on: April 13, 2010

Tractor trailer hits 2 cars, crosses center line, kills woman in Baldwin County

By Ken Shigley

Monday morning on Highway 49 near Milledgeville, a tractor trailer came over a hill and struck two other cars, then went into the opposite lane where it struck an oncoming vehicle. Rita Rose, 31, of Warthen, Georgia, was killed when the 18 wheeler struck her head on.

Further details were not mentioned in early media reports. Often such incidents are not just simple collisions, but the roots of tragedy are found in a pattern of corporate conduct that forces truck drivers to meet impossible delivery schedules and press on when they are outside their legal hours of operation and impaired by fatigue.
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Published on: April 10, 2010

18 wheeler kills motorist on I-20 in SC near North Augusta

By Ken Shigley

Thursday night on I-20 near North Augusta, SC, a tractor trailer changed lanes due to slowing traffic, forcing another motorist into the median and causing a fatal crash. Aaron Jennings of North Augusta was pronounced dead at the Medical Center of Georgia‘s emergency department. According to witnesses, Jennings was in the lane closest to the median when a tractor-trailer pulled in behind him from the slow lane and forced his Ford Explorer off the roadway and into the median where it rolled over several times.

The tractor trailer driver did not stop, but a witness took down information about the truck and the SC Highway Patrol was able to locate the driver. At last report, SC officials had not released information about the accident reconstruction investigation or what charges the tractor trailer driver might face.
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Published on: April 6, 2010

Two truck crashes in Augusta, GA to start Master’s week

By Ken Shigley

The week of the Master’s golf tournament in Augusta, Georgia, was kicked off with two truck crashes on Monday, April 5th.

In one, a woman was slowing to turn from Mike Padgett Highway onto 4-H Road when she was rear-ended by a speeding tractor trailer. She was reported to be in critical condition at Medical College of Georgia Hospital.

Fortunately, no injuries were reported when a dump truck jack-knifed and crashed on Bobby Jones Expressway.

Several readers of the Augusta Chronicle online edition commented about speeding log, chip and dump trucks in the area.
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Published on: March 31, 2010

Rear underride fatal when commuter strikes disabled tractor trailer in freeway traffic lane

By Ken Shigley

A fatal truck accident on a Los Angeles area freeway highlights a type of safety hazard we also see in Atlanta, Georgia.

In the predawn darkness last Friday, a passenger vehicle struck the rear of a disabled tractor trailer parked in a traffic lane on I-5 at Burbank, California, killing the driver of the car.

Media report are unclear as to how long the truck had been parked there, and as to whether it had hazard lights activated or reflective triangles deployed to warn oncoming traffic, as required by Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations. However, a comment posted on the KABC-TV web site, purportedly by a relative of the decedent, indicates that the man who was killed was commuting to work, and that there were no hazard flashers or reflective warning devices utilized on the tractor trailer.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations, at 49 CFR §392.22 requires:

(a) Hazard warning signal flashers. Whenever a commercial motor vehicle is stopped upon the traveled portion of a highway or the shoulder of a highway for any cause other than necessary traffic stops, the driver of the stopped commercial motor vehicle shall immediately activate the vehicular hazard warning signal flashers and continue the flashing until the driver places the warning devices required by paragraph (b) of this section. The flashing signals shall be used during the time the warning devices are picked up for storage before movement of the commercial motor vehicle. The flashing lights may be used at other times while a commercial motor vehicle is stopped in addition to, but not in lieu of, the warning devices required by paragraph (b) of this section.

(b) Placement of warning devices-

(b)(1) General rule. Except as provided in paragraph (b)(2) of this section, whenever a commercial motor vehicle is stopped upon the traveled portion or the shoulder of a highway for any cause other than necessary traffic stops, the driver shall, as soon as possible, but in any event within 10 minutes, place the warning devices required by §393.95 of this subchapter, in the following manner:

(b)(1)(i) One on the traffic side of and 4 paces (approximately 3 meters or 10 feet) from the stopped commercial motor vehicle in the direction of approaching traffic;

(b)(1)(ii) One at 40 paces (approximately 30 meters or 100 feet) from the stopped commercial motor vehicle in the center of the traffic lane or shoulder occupied by the commercial motor vehicle and in the direction of approaching traffic; and
(b)(1)(iii) One at 40 paces (approximately 30 meters or 100 feet) from the stopped commercial motor vehicle in the center of the traffic lane or shoulder occupied by the commercial motor vehicle and in the direction away from approaching traffic.

The investigation apparently continues.
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