Texas Truck Accident Attorney

Representing client's in Sherman and Throughout Texas

After you’ve been injured in a truck acccident, you may think that the other party’s insurance company will play fair with you – but that isn’t always the case.

Insurance companies are in the business of saving money and paying as little as possible in an insurance claim. In order to protect your rights and obtain your rightful compensation, you will need to hire an experienced Texas truck accident attorney from David K. Wilson & Associates, Attorneys at Law.

Even a quick glance at commercial truck accident statistics highlights the dangers that these vehicles pose to passenger cars. According to the Insurance Institute of Highway Safety (IIHS), 3,852 people were killed in commercial truck accidents in 2015. But the staggering statistic is that 69 percent of the people killed in truck wrecks were the occupants of other vehicles.

That’s a stark reminder that commercial truck drivers that cause accidents also cause devastating fatalities that too often only affect the passengers and drivers of the vehicles that they hit.

Common Causes of Commercial Truck Accidents

Many of the causes of commercial truck accidents are also present in auto accidents, but the difference is that mistakes in a commercial vehicle can be significantly more damaging. The most common causes of commercial trucking accidents include:

• Speeding – speeding is the most common cause of truck accidents. It takes much longer for a commercial truck to come to a complete stop than it does for a passenger vehicle to stop. Truck drivers who speed are also more likely to practice other unsafe driving actions, such as improper lane changes.
• Driver Distraction – any activity such as texting, speaking on a mobile phone (hands-free or not), talking to a passenger, eating, reaching down to grab something off the floor, reaching into a glove compartment, or looking at a GPS device is considered distracted driving. This behavior is dangerous, because it takes a truck driver’s eyes off the road, or takes a truck driver’s hands off the wheel. It also reduces reaction time when a driver must take evasive action due to an unexpected occurrence on the road.
• Impairment – commercial truck drivers who consume alcohol, abuse illicit drugs, and take prescription medication that makes them drowsy are much more likely to cause a truck accident.
• Fatigue – driver fatigue is a huge problem in the trucking industry, so much so that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has issued a mandatory rule that all truck drivers use electronic logging devices (ELDs) in their trucks by December of this year. ELDs make it impossible for drivers to falsify their logbooks, which detail the amount of rest they have had during the day. ELDs also allow truck carriers to observe their drivers through video monitoring to ensure that they follow safe driving practices.