Georgia Truck Accident Lawyers Blog

There's a system that will help you to determine which motorcoach company may be the safety for you to travel with. This system is a part of the Compliance, Safety, Accountability (CSA) Operational Model and it called the Safety Measurement System (SMS), according to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

This system looks into the traveling safety performance of carriers around the county in an attempt to locate dangerous fleets that the Administration feels need an intervention. These interventions are used to help find the problems that a driver or a carrier may have in the ability to prevent commercial bus accidents in Georgia and elsewhere. The program doesn't stop there. It will continue to monitor companies to determine where problems are improving or getting worse. The new program is a replacement for the SafeStat system.

Our Atlanta trucking accident lawyers understand how important it is for the FMCSA to conduct an intervention with companies that may have a less than perfect record. With the governing of the FMCSA, motorcoach companies are more likely to provide safe modes of transportation. The FMCSA receives a bulk of the safety information from various roadside inspections. The Administration also obtains information regarding State-reported crashes and safety-based violations.

Performance is quantified through these Behavior Analysis and Safety Improvement Categories (BASICs):

-Hours-of-Service/Fatigued Driving: This violation includes drivers of commercial motor vehicles who have been cited for driving while fatigued, sick or in non-compliance with the HOS regulations. This citation also includes violations regarding HOS logbooks and other forms of fatigued driver management.

-Unsafe Driving: This violation occurs when a driver operates a commercial vehicle in a careless or dangerous manner. These violations include recklessness, speeding, inattention, improper lane change, etc.

-Controlled Substances/Alcohol. This violation is issued when a driver is operating a company vehicle while under the influence of illegal drugs, alcohol or while misusing over-the-counter or prescription medications.

-Driver Fitness: This violation is issued when a driver is unfit to operate a commercial vehicle. This can result because of medical qualifications, lack of experience of inadequate training. All drivers must be properly trained and licensed.

-Cargo-Related: A company can receive a violation under this category if it neglected to prevent loads from shifting, spilling or dropping.

-Vehicle Maintenance: This is a violation for failing to properly maintain commercial vehicles. This includes lights, brakes, etc.

-Crash Indicator: This violation will be received when a company experiences frequent accidents. This violation includes both the frequency and the severity of all recorded accidents.

If a company is cited with several of these violations, then the FMCSA will step in and conduct an intervention to ensure that the problems are resolved. All of these factors play a role in your safety and should not be taken lightly. All consumers are urged to check the stats and ratings of a company before taking a trip.

Continue reading " New System in Place to Prevent Injury in Georgia from Trucking and Commercial Bus Accidents " »

Officers around the country will be conducting thousands of unannounced safety inspections on motorcoach vehicles, companies and school buses for the kickoff of the national Motorcoach Safety Summit. This Summit is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA). The kickoff celebration will take place in Washington D.C.

This event is used to raise awareness and educate drivers about simple safety steps that can avoid commercial bus accidents in Georgia and elsewhere. We have seen too many fatal accidents resulting from inadequate safety standards enforced by motorcoach companies. The Summit aims to raise the bar of safety to increase the safety of everyone on our roadways.

"This summit is about preventing needless tragedies and saving lives," said U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

Our Atlanta trucking accident attorneys would like to let the public know that this two-week inspection period will start on the 7th of October. During this time, officials will be on the lookout for motorcoach vehicles and corresponding companies that are not holdings its fleet to the highest of safety standards. As an additional part of the safety campaign, the FMCSA will be releasing a new smartphone application that will allow residents to search through all motorcoach companies to view safety record before choosing a company to travel with. This app will be released in November. The program also allows the public to submit any information regarding safety violations to the National Consumer Compliant Database .

During the Summit in D.C., the Motorcoach Safety Summit, a number of safety leaders will be meeting to talk about the Department of Transportation's approach to strengthen the safety standards for these motorcoach companies and vehicles. After the discussion, a panel of experts will discuss the importance and the responsibilities of daily safety precautions for the passengers of these vehicles as well as for the drivers and the vehicles.

The Motorcoach Safety Summit has been an ongoing effort to create stricter standards and ways to enforce the standards to help ensure motorcoach safety. Over the last five years, the FMCSA has doubled the number of inspections on buses and has conducted roughly 4,000 reviews on buses across the country.

In 2005, there were less than 13,000 inspections conducted by the FMCSA. In 2010, there were more than 25,700. From 2005 to 2010, the compliance results of these inspections jumped more than 120 percent.

Even with fines ranging from $2,000 to $25,000 for safety violations, motorcoach accidents continue to plague our roadways. Consumers are urged to research a potential company before agreeing to do business. If you experience an accident with one of these companies, it is critical for you to contact an experienced attorney as there may be multiple parties involved, including drivers, motorcoach companies, vehicle manufacturers and other motorists.

Continue reading " National Motorcoach Safety Summit in D.C. to Help Prevent Injury in Georgia and Elsewhere " »

According to local authorities, a trucking accident in Austell resulted in radioactive material all over the eastbound lanes of Interstate 20 for about five hours.

The Cobb County Fire Department reported that the radioactive medical-related material started to pour onto the pavement in the middle of the night as the driver headed down the Interstate between Fulton Industrial Boulevard and Six Flags Drive as he lost control of the big rig.

Authorities report that the 18-wheeler had a load of eight separate containers that were filled with the radioactive material. Seven of them busted open during the incident, according to WSBTV.

"He came up kind of close on another vehicle and swerved to miss it and he hit the guard rail and that's what made it overturn," said Dennell Boyd, a spokeswoman for the Fire Department.

Our Georgia trucking accident attorneys understand how dangerous accidents with large trucks can be. The danger and the consequences are greatly increased when the large vehicle is carrying hazardous cargo. The Georgia Environmental Protection Division had to work through the night to get the mess cleaned up by morning rush hour.

According to government accident statistics, thousands of people who transport dangerous cargo on trucks pose increased dangers of causing serious injury on our roadways. These risks are increased when conditions work against the trucker, including weather conditions, road conditions, driver skills, distractions and other motorists.

Dangerous cargo can include infectious and poisonous substances, radioactive material, liquids, gasses and explosives. Dangerous cargo can also be defined as loosely secured cargo that has the ability to become disconnected with the truck and fly into your driving path. Overloading a truck with cargo as makes it dangerous as it's more susceptible to flip or veer out of control.

A number of driver factors can contribute to lose cargo on our roadways, including driver negligence or carelessness, driver fatigue, alcohol or drug impairment, driver distractions and speeding.

Truckers and trucking companies are required to meet a number of federal regulations and adhere to laws to help ensure the safety of everyone on our roadways. Commercial truckers are also required to keep their log book and insurance information handy at all times.

Truckers must remain within a maximum axle weight law, make sure the roads they're traveling are safe enough to handle their vehicle's weight and stop at designated weight stations. If these laws, or any others, are broken, drivers will not only face serious fines, but they can cause a serious accident and find themselves in a legal mess.

If you have been involved in an accident with a commercial truck and have been injured as a result of unsafe cargo, you're urged to contact an experienced attorney to help you to determine liability. Drawing this conclusion requires a thorough investigation and knowledge of the current trucking regulations, laws and standards.

Continue reading " Trucking Accident in Austell Spills Radioactive Liquid over Interstate 20 " »

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is making another attempt to reduce the risks of distracted driving-related trucking accidents in Georgia and elsewhere. The most recent attempt comes after a court hearing pertaining to a fatal trucking accident that took the lives of 11 people and took out local shops in Kentucky back in March of last year, according to USA TODAY.

Officials believe that a cell phone was the cause of that accident as the Alabama driver's phone records state that he was on his phone just mere seconds before the accident. Investigators also discovered that he had made nearly 70 calls and texts in just the 24-hour period leading up to the accident.

Our Atlanta trucking accident attorneys understand that using a cell phone while operating a motor vehicle can turn deadly in just seconds, especially when the driver's vehicle is a large truck. Drivers need to remember that no phone call and no text message is worth the life of you or another motorist or yours. All drivers are urged to curb distractions and keep full focus on the roadway at all times. Phone calls and texts can wait.

NTSB chairman Deborah Hersman says that she expects a majority of truckers to oppose these recommendations, but as these types of accident are becoming more and more frequent, a ban like this is necessary.

The NTSB has handed the recommendation over to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA). The new recommendation aims to take over the ban of commercial truck drivers sending text messages while driving. Currently, If a truck driver is busted, they can wind up with a fine of nearly $3,000. That law was passed in September of 2010, but the NTSB wants stricter laws. The ban of all hand-held devices is expected to get a final ruling later this fall.

There are no states that currently ban the use of all cell phones, including hands-free devices, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association. Less than 10 states and the District of Columbia ban drivers from using hand-held phones. There are 34 states that ban drivers from text messaging behind the wheel.

According to the most recently released statistics from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, there were more than 3,300 people killed in the United States in 2009 because of traffic accidents that involved a large truck. A large truck, for statistical purposes, is considered a vehicle weighing more than 10,000 pounds. Nearly 75,000 people were injured in these types of accidents during the same year.

Of the deaths that resulted from these accidents, roughly 75 percent were experienced by the occupants of vehicles other than the large truck, 10 percent were experienced by nonoccupants and 15 percent of the fatalities were experienced by those riding in the large truck. There were nearly 150 fatalities resulting from trucking accidents in Georgia throughout the year.

Many of these lives could have been saved if there were distracted driving-related regulations and bans in place to help keep truck driver focus on the roadway instead of on a phone. But it also takes common-sense actions by drivers to make our roadways safer.

Continue reading " Distracted Driver Causes Fatal Accident - NTSB Pushes for Stricter Laws to Reduce Trucking Accidents in Georgia, Elsewhere " »