CATASTROPHIC UNDERRIDE TRUCK ACCIDENTS A LEADING AND PREVENTABLE CAUSE OF DEATH
Many years ago, one of my law partners, John Morrissey, was catastrophically killed when his vehicle collided with the rear-end of a truck parked on the side of the road in the dark of evening. This is known as a truck rear underride accident. Unfortunately, underride accidents are a common cause of death and catastrophic injuries. An underride occurs when a passenger's vehicle collides with the rear-end or side end of a truck, trailer or other large commercial vehicle, does not equip with a defective underride guards or bumpers, without an underride rail, lower bumper or guard, the vehicle underrides the trucks rear or side frame by traveling beneath the chassis of the larger vehicle. The impact between the heavy frame of a truck, whether in the rear or on the side, is equally devastating to the occupants to the car or vehicle. The roof support or roof pillars of the vehicle are not engineered to withstand the tremendous forces of such a crash and can collapse as a result of the wedge effect of the deadly impact forces.
For almost 30 years, the Pennsylvania motor vehicle lawyers at Reiff and Bily have handled thousands of motor vehicle accident cases involving trucks, buses and automobiles.
In January 1996, NTHSA issued two new Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSSs) that were designed to reduce the number of injuries and fatalities resulting from the collision of passenger vehicles with the rear-ends of heavy trailers and semi-trailers. The first standard, FMVSS number 223, "where impact guards" specifies the performance or requirements the rear impact guards must meet. The second standard, FMVSS number 224 "rear impact protection" requires that most new trailers and semi-trailers with a GVWR of 10,000 pounds or more be equipped with a rear impact guard that meets the requirements of FMVSS number 223. The requirement of these FMVSSs became effective in January 1998. NTHSA had been studying the issue of rear underride cases for many years and proposed solutions to the problems as early as 1981. The agency had taken two approaches to the problem. The first deals with increasing the conspicuity of large vehicles in an effort to prevent rear impact crashes. FMVSS number 108, "lamps, reflective devices and associated equipment" requires retro reflective materials on the sides and rear of all trailers of 80 or more inches width and with a gross vehicle GVWR of 10,000 pounds or more. That standard became effective in December 1993 and has been proven to be very effective in reducing incidents or rear and side impacts into trailers and semi-trailers. Even with the existing and new legislation, rear underrides are going to still occur due to the large number of older trailers, buses and other large scale commercial vehicles on the roads of the United States.
As time goes by, the numbers will hopefully decrease as those older tractor-trailers and other semi-trailers are taken out of service and retired to salvage yards. Trailers, floats, platform trailers and freight vans have incorporated new and more common sense standards resulting in a safer more crash-worthy product but much more needs to be done to impress upon many of the trailer makers to go beyond the minimal standards imposed by NTHSA. Additionally, more legislation must be written to force semi-trailer manufacturers to engineer trailers with side impact underride guards, box or rear guards to prevent the needless and senseless death of so many. Underride collisions are typically the most horrific and most deadly types of crashes that we have seen. These reportedly represent 25% of the fatalities of all truck involved collisions. Most commonly, underride accidents occur in the evening. Most standard equipment, such as box trailers, will have enough contrasting capabilities to allow them to be seen during daylight hours. However, under certain circumstances, it can cause underrides to occur during daylight hours as well. The angle of the sun will often time make it difficult to see a truck that is stopped on the highway. Trucks with protruding loads, such as I beams, pipes or lumbar, are at high risk for daytime underrides. These protruding loads generally are small targets, have poor reflective qualities, are darkly colored and create an optical situation or “illusion” that does not highly contrast with background.
A general misconception is that the large size of a truck makes them conspicuous. At night obviously, the size of a trailer by itself will not make it conspicuous, it is the other contrast problems that will make the trailer virtually impossible to see. Without any close end lighting reflecting off the painted surface of the trailer, a parked or stopped trailer can appear black against a black background. The approaching drivers have to rely on side marker lights or reflectors to see the presence of trailers. Marker lights are small and can be spaced as far as 26 feet apart on the side of the trailer not providing oncoming drivers with enough information to determine that what they are looking at is a trailer. Marker lights can often be misleading and without an external light source, trailers are often not identified until it is too late, when the headlights of oncoming vehicles are directly upon them, illuminating them. When their headlights illuminate the trailer, oncoming drivers may only be 100 to 200 feet away and unable to stop at higher speeds.
Our Pennsylvania vehicle accident law firm has been involved with the investigation in the handling of underride cases and have worked with trucking experts, visual acuity experts, accident reconstructionists and investigators to determine the complex factors that contribute to cause side and rear underride collisions.
Another obvious factor is inoperative or dirty lights on the trailer's side. Ambient lighting intensity and placement can also contribute to the cause of the collision. As you are driving at night, your eyes adapt to bright lights and changing lights on the road, sometimes creating what is known as black holes. This makes it very difficult for a driver to see any trailer, whether it is lit or unlit. Truck drivers assume that their trucks are highly visible which, in fact, is often not the case. Another situation can occur when a driver leaves a very bright area and enters an area of little or no light. Under these circumstances, which is known as dark adaption, drivers will have difficulty seeing dark objects, such as a semi-trailer, until their eyes adapt to the change in light and intensity.
There are steps that trucking companies, truck owners and manufacturers can take to prevent catastrophic injuries resulting from underride and override accidents. At the Pennsylvania vehicle accident law firm of Reiff and Bily, our job is to hold the trucking companies and the manufacturers accountable for the damages that they have caused. If your loved one was the victim of a fatal truck crash, please contact an experienced personal injury attorney at the Pennsylvania vehicle accident law firm of Reiff and Bily. We have been helping injured people and grieving families achieve financial compensation after tragic car and truck override and underride accidents for many years.
