North Carolina truck accidents are enormous and often catastrophic events. When we see the wreckage on local news reels or YouTube video clips, we are often dumbstruck at the carnage. Trucks are big. They are powerful. They are capable of not only destroying other vehicles on the road, but also of doing serious structural damage to roads, buildings, and structures like bridges and ramps.

Unfortunately, because the end results of accidents are so enormous and dramatic and emotionally gripping, we tend to think that the causes of these wrecks also must likely be big and easy to spot. We might, for instance, think that a truck driver that caused a big wreck on the freeway had been dosing himself with unbelievable amounts of methamphetamine. Maybe he was trying to drive across the country in 100 hours flat, without ever stopping to rest or sleep, for instance. And sometimes the cause IS dramatic — a brake snaps and fails during a critical freeway moment, for instance. But often, the root-cause of accidents is far more subtle:

•    A dirty windshield, for instance, can distract a driver, preventing him from seeing a truck approaching along his side;
•    A truck driver fails to notice a freeway sign that indicates that his particular type of vehicle should not be on the road, given the weather conditions or the size of his load;
•    The drivers of both vehicles get distracted by a sports game on the radio and thus fail to react with exquisite enough precision to avoid collision.

So you can have these subtle causes.

Here is something else that’s interesting. Many accidents have MULTIPLE causes – or contributing factors – some of which may be extremely subtle and difficult to detect, even with the most cutting-edge forensics. A truck driver who is borderline diabetic and who has blood sugar issues might, for instance, suffer a lapse of judgment – or a degradation in his driving capabilities. But unless you do blood work on that driver and manage to connect his pre-diabetes with the accident, this contributing factor would be very difficult to detect.

Fortunately, you don’t have to do the investigative and legal legwork by yourself. You can connect with an experienced North Carolina truck accident law firm, like DeMayo Law, to help understand your rights and potential avenues of recourse.

More Web Resources:

Subtle Factors which can Influence Your Driving

On Saturday March 31st, a tragic North Carolina car crash on Interstate 77 took the life of 16-year-old Thomas Luciano, a student at South Mecklenburg High School. According to local reports from WCNC, Luciano was thrown out of an SUV during the crash – he had not been wearing a safety belt. The other passengers and the driver survived, although another passenger, Roland Calhoun, had to undergo surgery for an injury he sustained in the crash. Luciano’s friends painted a big rock outside their high school with messages remembering and celebrating him.

Tragedies like this car crash occur far too often in North Carolina and elsewhere. What can we learn from situations like this? Since the police investigation of the accident has not yet concluded, we can’t really say much about the cause of the crash. If it’s true that Luciano was not been wearing his safety belt, most accident investigators would probably say that omission was significant. But accidents are peculiar and eccentric events. Yes, the statistics definitely show that people who wear safety belts are more likely to survive car crashes and avoid injuries.

But when we jump too quickly to conclusions, we can shortchange ourselves and any friends or family members hurt in a crash. For instance, maybe you, too, recently got hurt in a North Carolina car crash in which you had not be wearing a seatbelt or in which “you drove too fast.” Or something. In other words, you believe that you were at fault in some fashion. You could just accept this diagnosis and try to move on with your life. But a detailed analysis may show that some other factor was also involved – perhaps, crucially so. For instance, maybe your car’s brakes malfunctioned. Maybe the road itself had a design flaw that caused your car to spin out on a curve.

The takeaway is that you may find it extremely useful to get an objective, clearheaded, experienced perspective on what happened. A North Carolina car crash law firm, for instance, can help you protect your rights and preserve potential opportunities to collect compensation from a reckless driver, careless mechanic, or other party.

More Web Resources:

“Classmates Mourn Teen Killed in Crash” WCNC.com Charlotte.

South Mecklenburg High School

When we talk about North Carolina car accident prevention, we usually stick to the basics and to reality – we talk about technologies like airbags, ABS, seatbelts, etc. We analyze the effectiveness of these technologies and speculate about how we could deploy them more frequently and in better and cooler ways. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with this kind of thinking. But if you really want to make progress with North Carolina car accident prevention, you may need to go beyond the conventional ideas and really think about the nature of auto safety itself.

After all, auto safety is not just about technology! Nor is it just about driver behavior. Nor is it just about road engineering. Nor is it just about traffic control. Auto safety really is a broad discipline that can be affected — and can affect — many, many arenas of life. So when you look at improving auto safety just through the lens of “let’s build better technology to make people safer” you may be taking an overly narrow view of the subject.

There are undoubtedly many leverage points we could push on that would lead to better road safety. Improvements in driver behavior. Improvements in driver education and training. Improvements in road engineering. Improvements in automobile engineering. Improvements in the way that auto safety experts talk to one another and share solutions. Improvements in the science of auto safety and on and on.

But a more holistic appreciation of these factors is needed.

It’s needed not “real folks” — not just for the eggheads who come up with policies and write articles about this subject for public consumption. Driving can be a hugely perilous activity – as this blog and others have cited many times over, the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration has estimated that 40,000 Americans die every year in car crashes… and millions are injured. This is a clear and present issue for all of us. We could probably benefit from knowing more about auto safety. Sure, it’s great to know that certain cars with ABS or with such and such kind of airbag are safer than other cars with different safety features. And yes: it’s good to be reminded of the fact that we need to keep our cars well maintained to avoid breakdowns like tire failures and faulty brakes. And it’s good to know that we shouldn’t be driving while overly fatigued or driving under the influence of alcohol or so forth.

But what ELSE might we be able to do to improve our safety consciousness – to protect ourselves and our loved ones out there? And perhaps, more interestingly, what “stuff” can we STOP doing that has really no affect on our safety – or a negative affect – and that costs us time and money and energy, only to give us a false sense of security?

This blog post obviously cannot answer all these questions. But it’s important to raise them and begin a more flourishing discussion about them, since so much is at stake for so many people.

That being said, if you’ve already been in an auto accident, you may benefit from talking with a North Carolina car accident law firm today.