One of the first things most of us were taught by our parents when we started driving was to always watch out for the big trucks. They are called the kings of the road for a reason. A large truck is like a freight train barreling down the highway and you don’t want to be caught in its path if it needs to stop suddenly and is unable to. Recent rule changes, though, will help with that particular problem.
Last year the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced tough new braking rules for large trucks. These new rules are expected to save over 200 lives annually and will prevent hundreds of serious injuries. The new rule will require that a tractor-trailer traveling at 60 m.p.h.. be able to come to a complete stop in 250 feet. The previous standard allowed them up to 355 feet. The new rule improves stopping distance by 30 percent. Just to put that in perspective, according to estimates from the National Safety Council’s Defensive Driving Course for Professional Truck Drivers, a loaded tractor-trailer, in reality, requires 525’ of stopping distance when traveling at 65 m.p.h. under the current standards. This estimate includes the distance traveled during reaction time. As a comparison, a passenger vehicle traveling at 65 m.p.h. can stop – including reaction time – in 316’. Even under the best of circumstances, it takes the truck almost twice as long to stop as it does the passenger car. As you may imagine, this makes the truck considerably more dangerous and more prone to be involved in an accident. The new rule is a welcome bit of news for American drivers traveling the highways.
While large trucks (trucks with a gross weight of over 10,000 pounds) account for only about 3% of the vehicles on the road in a given day, they are involved in a disproportionate percentage of accidents. Recent statistics report that they are involved in about 8% of all accidents. In 2008, an alarming 4,066 large trucks were involved in fatal crashes. Large trucks were also involved in 128,725 non-fatal crashes in that same year. The previous year, one of nine traffic fatalities resulted from a collision with a large truck. The majority of these fatalities (75%) are occupants of the other vehicle involved in the accident – not the driver of the truck itself. It is not hard to imagine who will suffer the bulk of the injuries when a large truck, that can be up to 40 times heavier than a passenger vehicle, collides with a family vehicle. While we cannot do anything to level the playing field between large truck and family car, we can require large trucks to be driven as safely as possible. With the advent of improved brake technology, we can give the truck drivers the ability to greatly improve their stopping distance. The new brake rule is an excellent example of the steps that are being taken to reduce the risk to the nation’s drivers and occupants.
If you have been involved in a truck accident and would like further information, contact the law offices of Ledger & Associates at 1-800-300-0001 or visit us at www.ledgerlaw.com.
