VANS AND SUVs NEEDLESSLY CONTINUE TO KILL STUDENTS ON PENNSYLVANIA ROADS
On August 20, 2008, yet another van carrying a college sports team crashed in Burgettstown, Pennsylvania, killing one athlete and injuring six of her teammates. Kelley Roggensack, a Franciscan University sophomore was pronounced dead at the scene. According to news reports, the van veered off U.S. Route 22 in Hanover Township, Pennsylvania and police attribute the crash to the driver’s loss of control while she was trying to avoid a tire in the road, causing the van to crash into the woods.
Our experienced SUV and van rollover lawyers at the Pennsylvania SUV law firm of Reiff and Bily understand that victims of rollover accidents sustain some of the most significant and catastrophic injuries, including but not limited to fatalities, and than other type of auto accidents.
Because of their high center of gravity, vans and SUVs are more prone to rollover than any other type of vehicle and SUV occupants are three times as more likely to die in a rollover accident than those in a typical automobile accident. Although a story such as the case mentioned above indicates that the driver was in error, our research and experience indicates that accident avoidance maneuvers taken by drivers are foreseeable by the manufacturers, yet they continue to build vehicles that are unsafe for the purposes that they were allegedly designed.
Some alarming SUV facts from NTHSA include:
1. Ejections account for 63% of all fatalities in all rollover crashes and often result in debilitating head injuries.
2. More than 90% of passenger vehicle rollover crashes are single rollover crashes and more than 80% of occupant deaths in rollover crashes occurred in single vehicle crashes.
3. More than half of the single vehicle crashes resulted from rollovers compared with 11% of multiple vehicle crashes.
4. More than 50% of all SUV related deaths are attributed to rollovers and crashes which the manufactures claim were driver errors but in fact, were design defects.
The Pennsylvania SUV and rollover motor vehicle accident firm of Reiff and Bily has been involved in the investigation and successful prosecution of van and SUV rollover cases in Pennsylvania and other states in the nation, including a church van rollover that occurred in Tennessee in which four church members were killed and several others injured. Tragically, churches, colleges and other organizations have been prone to such accidents due to the popularity of these vans. These vans were originally designed for cargo and not passengers and have been adopted by profit-seeking companies to carry people. This has resulted in many accidents such as the one mentioned above.
Too often we notice that the State Police and even other lawyers who are used to handling “Easy-A” car accident cases without any expertise in the area of van rollover and SUV rollovers jump to the conclusion that it was simply driver error that caused the accident. Every day innocent victims and drivers are being blamed for accidents that could have been prevented by the manufacturers who had knowledge that their vehicles were defective.
If you or a member of your family has been involved in an SUV rollover accident, a van rollover accident, a truck rollover with a severe roof crush, a roof pillar collapse failure or any other serious accident or failure or ejected from a vehicle and you have questions about whether the vehicle or vehicle design may have caused or attributed to the accident and/or injuries, call the experienced SUV rollover lawyers and experienced motor vehicle lawyers at the Philadelphia law firm of Reiff and Bily who have a 30 year track record of litigation experience for a free consultation at 1-800-421-9595 or email us at www.reiffandbily.com
