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Posts Tagged ‘Truck Accident Attorneys’

Gordon & Elias, truck accident attorneys. Todd Elias on the left; Steve Gordon on the rt

Truck accident lawyers, Gordon & Elias, agree with Deborah A.P. Hersman, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) that driver fatigue “is one of the most insidious issues in the transportation industry,” and more needs to be done to address this problem.

Truck accidents caused by driver fatigue have become a national problem and it is getting worse. The country’s health practitioners have been aware of an increase in persons suffering from sleep deprivation for many years. Medical problems such as sleep apnea and acid reflux, which causes constant sleep interruption, are the number one causes of driver fatigue. In addition, even drivers that are not suffering from these health problems but simply are driving more than the permissible amount of hours due to economic necessity also is a cause of driver fatigue.

The trucking industry is just now beginning to recognize it as an industry wide safety concern. However, 99% of the companies, instead of embracing the issue and trying to institute safeguards to protect the public are, instead, trying to take the position that their only responsibility is to make sure their driver has a valid medical certificate. The problem requires a much deeper and broader approach. A few trucking companies have tried to address the problem properly and they are to be commended.

In the video below, truck accident attorney, Steve Gordon, believes a truck driver is what he calls “stuck between a rock and a hard place.” The truck driver has got to make his route. He’s got to make his deliveries on time. He’s got to get from Point A to Point B, and the company expects him to do it in a certain time.

There are federal regulations about driver fatigue which govern how many hours a trucker can drive. A long haul trucker has a cab in the back and they are supposed to, after a certain amount of hours, get off duty rest and sleep. However, more times than you can even imagine, the trucker has driven more than he should causing his responses to be slow. And when that happens, there are people that are injured and worse yet killed.

Mr. Gordon goes on to say in the video that a trucker is suppose to be an expert in their field. They have a commercial driver’s license. This is the field they have chosen to do for their career. They have a duty, being an expert, to do their job right, just like a lawyer. We can’t take a case and just halfway work on it or do it a little bit, and a trucker shouldn’t either. So when a truck driver has driver fatigue and that causes an accident, the depositions of that trucker — they’re not pretty.

He states that there are driver’s logs that you can look at, and that some drivers even go as far as to falsify those logs. He goes on to say, “when that happens, that is not only a crime, but it upsets a jury very much and high awards are seen in driver falsification log issues cases.”

So you have two things. You have the trucking company making these unreasonable demands on the truck driver, and you have the truck driver instead of saying, hey wait, I cannot do it within this time frame because the law requires me to get rest. You have the truck driver making the second mistake and then you have the accident. So clearly when it’s driver fatigue issues, the trucking company and the driver are usually at fault.

For more information contact Gordon & Elias, L.L.P., Truck Accident Attorneys at Law.

Call Toll Free 1-800-773-6770