Articles Posted in Car Accidents

Graduated drivers license programs exist to prevent teen driving accidents by slowly giving young people more privileges and more responsibilities behind the wheel. Graduated driving license laws, however, work only when they are enforced and when teens obey them. Law enforcement cannot be everywhere at all times, so parents are usually in the best position to make sure their young teen drivers are following the letter of the law and making smart driving decisions.

Unfortunately, recent studies have shown that parents may not really be aware of what their kids are doing. There are major disconnects in parental attitudes towards graduated driving license restrictions and teen views on these restrictions, and teens are obeying the law way less often than their parents think they are. Our Boston car accident lawyers know that this means many young people are in danger and many parents need to take a different approach that provides more protection for their kids and other motorists on the road.
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Massachusetts and 41 other states have banned texting and driving, and our Boston car accident lawyers know that as many as 94 percent of respondents to a federal survey have said that they support laws prohibiting texting. Yet, even as police issue citations and drivers express concern that cell phone use is dangerous, motorists continue to use their cell phones in the car every day.

The Boston Globe has recently taken a close look at why so many drivers continue to text even when they know it is risky. The answer that many experts have come up with: checking your phone is a powerful habit for many and checking the phone has become almost automatic.
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Cruise control is one of the most popular features on cars and can make long trips much more pleasant for drivers. One key question, though, is whether cruise control makes driving safer or whether it increases the risk of accidents. A French study attempted to answer this question, but as the Boston Herald reports, the results showed that the impact of cruise control on an accident risk is not clear-cut.

Our Boston car accident lawyers know that the NHTSA has listed adaptive cruise control as an important emerging crash avoidance technology that could mitigate the effects of poor driver performance. Unfortunately, adaptive cruise control technologies are still costly and out of reach for most motorists, so motorists using their standard cruise control need to understand how its use can both make driving safer and how using cruise control can create accident risks.
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Car accident fatalities are always tragic, but it can be especially devastating when a young child or infant is killed by a dangerous or reckless driver. Our auto accident attorneys in Massachusetts know that no matter how carefully a parent or guardian drives, a child’s life could be endangered by other negligent motorists on the road.

While there is nothing a parent can do to keep dangerous drivers off the road, parents can help to protect their children by making sure their kids are in a car seat or wearing a seat belt at all times. A National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) news release has emphasized the importance of properly securing children in a vehicle, offering some tips to parents and caregivers to help keep kids safe in case an auto accident happens.
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According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), tire failures cause around 11,000 car accidents every year in the United States.

These car accidents occur for many different reasons, including separation of the treads of tires; tire blowouts; bald tires; and tires that are underinflated.

Our Boston defective tire attorneys know that poorly designed and badly manufactured tires are one of the primary reasons for tire-related accidents. However, there are also other causes as well, such as a failure on the part of drivers to maintain their tires properly. Now, the NHTSA is reminding car owners that the risk of tire-related accidents is higher in the summer months if tires are not properly maintained.

NHTSA Tire Warning for Summer Weather

The NHTSA advisory warns that the summer is a bad time for tire-related accidents. Unfortunately, the heat can exacerbate tire problems and the warmth of the pavement can contribute to the breakdown of tires. This is especially a problem when cars travel along highways at high speeds, with the hot roadways and the friction from the car travel making it more likely that a tire tread separation or blowout will happen.

If the tire fails as a result of a problem with the manufacturing or design of the tire, there is little that a driver can do to stay safe and the tire manufacturer should be held responsible for losses and damage that occur. However, if the tire fails as a result of a driver failing to maintain his vehicles, then the accident can be the fault of the driver.

Drivers who cause accidents through failure to maintain tires can put their lives at risk and can endanger passengers and other drivers. These motorists can also become legally liable for damage that they cause. To avoid this, drivers should follow some key safety recommendations put forth by the NHTSA. The NHTSA reminds drivers to:

• Check their vehicle manuals in order to determine the appropriate tire pressure in pounds per square inch and ensure that the tires are at the appropriate pressure.
• Keep a tire pressure gauge in their vehicles and check the PSI to ensure that the tires have not become underinflated. Tires can lose as much as one PSI each month, so checking the PSI regularly is important.
• Using the cars tire pressure monitoring system and taking action if the system issues a warning.
• Monitoring the tread of the tires on all vehicles and ensuring that the tires do not have treads worn down to 2/32 of an inch or less. A penny test can be used to make sure the tread is not too worn. If you put a penny in the tread of the tires with Lincoln’s head upside down, you shouldn’t be able to see the top of Lincoln’s head.

By following these tire maintenance and safety tips, you can reduce the chances of a serious accident occurring as a result of defective tires. You should also regularly check to ensure that your tires have not been recalled due to defects or problems.
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On their way to the Bonnaroo music festival, two Indiana natives tragically lost their lives in a massive wreck in Tennessee, which authorities now say was caused by a semi-truck driver, who has since been cited with failure to exercise due care.

Our Boston personal injury lawyers know that roadway hazards caused by fatigued or careless truckers is just one danger confronted by concert and festival-goers, many of whom travel long distances to see their favorite musicians and performers throughout the summer.

Bonnaroo, held in Tennessee, is one of the largest weekend-long festivals in the country. But there are a number of others that are still coming up and at which attendance is expected at least in the hundreds of thousands. Among those:

• Warped Tour, June 15 – Aug. 4, National Tour;
• Newport Folk Festival, July 27-28, Newport, RI;
• Lollapalooza, Aug. 2-4, Chicago, IL;
• Electric Zoo, Aug. 3 – Sept. 1, Randalls Island Park, NYC;
• Outside Lands, Aug. 9 – 11, San Francisco, CA;
• Rock the Bells, Aug. 17-19, Aug. 24-24 and Aug. 31-Sept. 1, San Bernadino, CA, Mountain View, CA and Holmdel, NJ;
• Burning Man, Aug. 26 – Sept. 2, Black Rock Desert, NV;
• Made in America, Aug. 31- Sept. 1, Philadelphia, PA;
• Austin City Limits, Oct. 4-6 and Oct. 11-13, Austin, TX.

In New England, regional festivals are popular draws through the summer and autumn months. While some patrons may spend the extra cash to fly in to their location, many are expected to make these trips by vehicle.

We understand that for many, the road trip is half the experience. We sincerely hope it is a memorable one – for all the right reasons.

Gearing up for long-distance travel means making safety a priority. Yes, the event may be all throwing caution to the wind, lowering your inhibitions and freely expressing yourself. But you have to make sure you and your friends get there and back safely. That takes some planning.

Consider the following before you head out:

• Have your vehicle checked out. You need to make sure your vehicle is in good shape. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration recommends that you take your car in for a full check-up. Have the mechanic check the belts, the hoses, the cooling system, the battery and the tires. Make sure to check your tire pressure regularly throughout the trip and keep an eye on your gas levels.
• Know where you’re going. If you’re traveling far from home, you want to avoid getting lost or stranded. GPS is fine in areas with an strong signal, but you have to consider that this may not be the case, particularly if you are traveling in more isolated terrains. Take paper maps too just in case.
• Figure out the best time to travel. If you can, avoid heavy traffic times and plan for inclement weather.
• Have supplies in your vehicle in case you do get stranded. Have your car charger, extra food, water, blankets, tire repair kit, first-aid kit, flashlight and road flares.
• Make sure you get enough sleep. We know you’re excited and you want to get there. But the NHTSA warns that some 100,000 crashes annually are the result of drivers who are really too tired to be behind the wheel. If you take the risk of driving while fatigued, not only could you miss the show, you could suffer serious, life-long consequences as well.

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Protecting kids is the top priority of every parent and parents need to know what types of risks their children face. Every year since 1998, a survey of Massachusetts students has been conducted in order to provide more information to educators and parents about some of the dangers that children in the area are facing. The survey is administered both to sixth grade students as well as to high school kids in eighth through twelfth grade.

This year, the youth risk survey gave parents plenty of reason to be concerned. In addition to showing that as many as four percent of high school males and five percent of high school females had attempted suicide over the past year, the survey also showed that many kids were drinking alcohol despite being under the legal age to drink. The survey also showed that a lot of kids are using drugs. Our Boston injury attorneys know that when kids drink, they are at serious risk of sexual assault, alcohol poisoning and drunk driving accidents.

Teen Drinking And Drug-Use is a Dangerous Epidemic

The Harvard Press reported on the results of the Massachusetts Youth Risk Survey, indicating that:

• Sixty-three percent of seniors at one local area high school had consumed alcohol over the past spring.
• Thirty-five percent of all responding students in grades 9-12 indicated that they had consumed alcohol during the past spring.
• For grades 9-12 combined, 32 percent of female students and 39 percent of male students admitted to using alcohol in the month prior to the survey.
• Forty-percent of students in grade 12 indicated that they had recently used marijuana.
• Among all students in grades 9-12, 22 percent admitted that they had used marijuana in the prior month.

Students who take drugs or who use alcohol are likely not just to stay at home while drunk or on drugs but instead to attend school dances or events, to go to parties or to go places with their friends. The Harvard Press, for example, indicating that schools expressed concern about students who had recently come to school dances while intoxicated in the prior year.

When these students drank or do drugs and they go places, they get behind the wheel of a car. They put themselves in danger when they do this, but they also put every other driver who is on the road with them at risk as well. A drunk or high teen may be even more dangerous behind the wheel than an intoxicated adult since teens are already more likely to get into car wrecks because of their inexperience.

Parents Need to Take Teen Drinking Seriously

As this data shows, teen drinking is not a small problem but is something that many teenagers choose to do. Parents need to be aware of the high numbers of kids who use alcohol or drugs and every parent should be sure to stress the dangers of driving drunk or high.
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Everyone today knows that it is illegal to drive with a blood alcohol content (BAC) above .08. The laws impose this limit to ensure that people do not drive when they are too impaired to react quickly, to pay attention and to make safe choices behind the wheel. Unfortunately, the laws may not be doing enough, as it is possible that those with a BAC below .08 may still be affected by alcohol and thus unable to drive safely.

Our Boston car accident attorneys knows that drunk driving accidents can be devastating and that it is important to do everything possible to prevent intoxicated people from getting behind the wheel. This is why new NTSB proposals on lowering the alcohol level constituting drunk driving could be a good thing that helps to reduce the risk of drunk driving crashes.

NTSB Considers Changing Permitted BAC Levels
According to NBC News, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) recently voted to recommend that states lower the permitted blood alcohol content levels and change their definitions of drunk driving.

The NTSB recommends that states drop the permitted BAC level down from .08 to .05. Currently, all 50 states in the United States define drunk driving using the .08 BAC rule, so this would be a widespread shift in drunk driving policy in the United States. However, changing the BAC level from .08 to .05 would put the United States more in line with other countries.

Currently, only Canada, Iraq, the United States and a few other locations have their drunk driving BAC set at .08. The majority of locations throughout Europe, including Russia, define intoxicated driving as having a BAC of .05 or higher. Most of South America and Australia also have a lower permitted BAC than in the United States and when Australia changed their laws from allowing a .08 BAC to .05 BAC, provinces in the country reported between a five and 18 percent decline in the number of traffic deaths.

Arguments for Change
Of course, adjusting our laws to match the rest of the world’s is not the only argument, nor the strongest argument, for reducing the allowable BAC level. The fact is that reducing the permitted BAC level could save lives.

According to the NTSB, some drivers begin to experience problems with depth perception and other visual functions once they have a BAC of .05 or higher. The chances of an accident at this level increase by 39 percent. By the time a person’s BAC level reaches .07, his or her cognitive abilities are likely to be impaired, and by the time the BAC rises to .08 percent, then the chances of an accident are increased by a full 100 percent.

Since a person begins to suffer impairment at .05 and the accident risk increases so dramatically, there is little reason to allow people to drive after they are at this stage of intoxication. Changing the law could reduce crashes and save lives, and lawmakers should seriously consider embracing the NTSB’s recommendation.
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The U.S. Supreme Court recently issued a decision in the case of US. Airways, Inc. v. McCutchen in a ruling that underscored common sense must be applied when third-party compensation litigation is involved.

In the end, the court found that an insurance company can’t force a person to reimburse the full cost of third-party compensation if doing so would actually make them worse off than had they not pursued third-party action in the first place.

This kind of scenario actually crops up fairly frequently, so our Boston injury lawyers were pleased to hear it being addressed.

This important case started in a rather ordinary way: With a car accident.

The plaintiff was an injured airline mechanic. He was injured in an off-the-job motor vehicle crash in which he was not at-fault, though he was badly injured. This individual had medical insurance through his employer, US Airways.

His total medical expenses ended up being nearly $67,000, which the company insurer covered without issue.

But here’s where it got tricky: The injured man then sued the other driver and his insurer. He won. As a result, he received total compensation in the amount of $110,000.

However, about 40 percent of that went to his attorneys, who helped him to win the case. What that meant was that he was then left with $66,000. This is a little less than what US Airways had paid.

The firm’s health plan had a clause that required injured parties to reimburse the company for any money it had paid out of what had been recovered by the third party.

What the justices were asked to decide was whether that policy meant that this injured man would have to fork over every single penny of that $66,000 he was awarded – plus another approximately $1,000 – or whether he was only required to reimburse a portion.

In the end, the court decided in favor of the injured man. The reasoning went this way:

There wasn’t actually any language at all in the health plan that mentioned the issue of attorneys’ fees. As Justice Elena Kagan wrote, that could be interpreted one of a couple of different ways. The first would be that the injured party would be required to pay back every single penny of the total he received from that third party. The second would be that the reimbursement would only be deducted after the “true” cost of recovery.

In other words, while the judgement was for $110,000, the true recovery in this case for the plaintiff was $66,000.

The justices reasoned that fairness would require the court to interpret the plan in the second way. She rightly pointed out that when it comes to third-party recoveries, they aren’t free. This man could not have expected to receive any compensation without the help of an attorney, whom he would rightly be expected to pay. But should the injured party be worse off for the fact that he pursued legal damages from the wrongful party?

The justices decided that unless there was some amount of cost sharing, the injured party’s health insurer would basically be getting a “free ride” – receiving all the compensation without having to put it any of the effort or investment it would take to receive reimbursement.

Further, by leaving the injured party even worse off, Kagen remarked, this man was in effect paying for the “privilege” of serving as a collection agent for the insurer.

Such an injustice could not stand.

The court did not decide exactly how much the injured man should have to pay. That question was remanded back to the lower court.
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A majority of parents say that they wish they would have spent more time with their teen drivers in high-risk situations. According to the National Safety Council (NSC), our teens aren’t always getting the proper education they need behind the wheel to stay safe out there.

To help parents and guardians with this important task, officials with The Allstate Foundation and with the NSC have teamed up to create life-saving and unique approaches to get the job done. It’s all there within the “Drive it Home” website.

Our Quincy car accident lawyers understand that motor vehicle accidents continue to be the number one cause of death for teens across the country. They’re actually more likely to get into a car accident during their first year behind the wheel than during any other time in their lives. Luckily, parents, guardians and mentors can help to reduce these risks — all it takes is a helping hand. We all have to make sure that we’re staying active in our young drivers’ lives. And now “Drive it Home” is going to make it a little easier.

“Drive it Home can help protect teen drivers, educate parents on the crucial role they play in the driving process, and help ensure our sons and daughters return home each and every night,” said Vicky Dinges with Allstate.

So how bad are we at helping? According to recent studies with Allstate, parents aren’t doing enough — and they’re regretting it later.

-Parents aren’t understanding the risks that their young drivers are up against.

-Driver inexperience is the number one cause of accidents and fatalities among this young age group.

-Even though about 90 percent of parents say that it’s important that their teens learn the importance of driving at night and driving with passengers, only about a third say that they’ve even covered these points with them.

-About 30 percent of parents aren’t settling household driving rules for their teens to follow. It’s important that we set these rules (and lay out the consequences for breaking them) to keep them safe behind the wheel. More enforcement means safer driving.

-More than 60 percent of parents say that they’re currently seeking help with their teen’s driving education.

One of the best things that you can do is to create a parent-teen driving contract. This is a contract signed by both you and your teen that agrees on driving privileges, rules and bad behavior consequences. When creating your contract, make sure you include rules regarding the number of passengers allowed in the vehicle, their driving curfew and communication standards.

You also should make sure that you’re spending plenty of time in the passenger’s seat. Ride along with your teen driver often. Make sure they know what they’re doing behind the wheel and offer them constructive criticism when you think they need some. Make sure your teen has lots of practice – the more practice, the better. Start off driving during the daytime, then gradually add practice at night and bad weather. You want to make sure that they’re ready for anything and everything out there.
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