Perhaps you’ve just been involved in an accident and you’re wondering if you need truck accident lawyers. The short answer is probably yes, if your collision involved a truck. Whether you were driving the truck or whether you were hit by the truck. You might be surprised to realize that there are a lot more trucking accidents than you’d think. In fact, in the United States alone, there are roughly 500,000 collisions involving trucks each year. However, only about 1% of those trucking accidents involve fatalities, thankfully this is small, nevertheless, that is still 5,000 unnecessary fatalities involving trucks each and every year. That’s 5,000 too many in my books. Further research has shown that 1 in 8 traffic accidents involve trucks.
So it is hard to tell from these facts if truck drivers are safer drivers as one would assume so if only 1 in 8 traffic collisions involve trucks, but at the same time there are fewer trucks on the road to. The most common reason cited for truck accidents is driver fatigue on the part of the truck driver. With the long miles logged on the roads and the push for just in time service, one could argue that this is putting a lot more stress and pressure on truck drivers to spend more time driving than perhaps is healthy. Not to say that the laws don’t help mitigate this to some degree, but still, humans are prone to error and if you have been involved in a trucking accident you should seek the advice of a truck accident lawyer.
As you can probably imagine, in a large majority of the cases, the truck driver, being in a larger vehicle is usually uninjured and therefore it is the motorist, cyclist or pedestrian who is most times injured in truck caused traffic accidents. Having said that, cyclists and pedestrians make up just a small portion of the 5,000 odd fatalities caused by trucks each year. Around 450 combined cyclists and pedestrians are killed by truck related collisions. If you or a loved one has been injured or worse in a semi trailer accident you need to contact trucking accident lawyers to determine your options for medical compensation and other financial compensation that you could be entitled too.
If you are concerned about the costs involved in hiring truck accident attorneys you needn’t be. Most of the better semi truck accident attorneys work on a contingency fee, so they only get paid on any settlement you’re entitled to. Bear in mind, if you just have a minor fender bender truck accident you likely don’t need an attorney. But if your call was totaled or there were any injuries you’ll definitely want to get in touch with a truck accident attorney, as most trucking companies, even though they carry millions of dollars worth of insurance coverage, are not inclined to pay you generously.