Articles Posted in Truck Accidents

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William Andrews was driving northbound on Western Avenue on Feb. 11, 2007 when his car collided with a pickup truck driven by defendant Luis Chavez. Chavez ran the red light while travelling westbound on 139th Street in Blue Island.

Andrews, 28, sustained a closed head injury with a brain bleed resulting in short-term memory loss, personality changes, uncontrolled emotions and mood swings, and a loss of his job as a cable installer for Comcast. He claimed inability to ever work again.

Luis Chavez was an undocumented Mexican national who did not have a valid driver’s license. After the crash, Chavez fled the scene on foot and was later convicted of leaving the scene of an accident involving injury.

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Clanton Pitchford, a truck driver, was in Tucson, Ariz., in 2006 and spent a night in his semi-trailer truck parked at a truck stop. The accident that caused this lawsuit was the collision with the rear end of Pitchford’s truck and a Knight Transportation truck traveling at about 5 mph.

Pitchford, 59, was sleeping in a raised bed behind the driver seat of his tractor when the collision took place.  He was tossed around, but did not fall out of the bed.  The accident caused Pitchford low back pain, which he did not have before this incident.

Pitchford went to a local emergency room five hours later and was diagnosed with a lumbar strain.

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In June 2009, two trucks on westbound Interstate 80 crashed near or on the right shoulder of the highway. The driver of a second tractor trailer for Jefferson Trucking Co., also on westbound 80, crashed into the rear end of the stopped truck operated by Randolph Ferguson, who was driving for Cresco Lines. The force of the two trucks moved the lead truck 1,200 to 1,500 feet farther down the highway, leaving debris and motor fluids on the roadway.

The plaintiff, Patty Lunn, who was also driving westbound on Interstate 80, came upon the accident scene. The Lunn vehicle skidded on the oily residue left by the trucks, her car became airborne and rolled over three times striking the top of the concrete overpass and median crash barrels before finally coming to rest on the median strip.

Plaintiff Janet Daft, Lunn’s passenger, sustained a collapsed lung and fractured vertebrae to her spine at C-2 and C-3, requiring cervical fusion. Daft already had osteoporosis, but will require future medical treatment as the fusion loosens due to the weakening of her bones. Both Lunn and Daft are school teachers.

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In 1991, the nation’s highways limited the weight of trucks at 80,000 pounds.  That has been the law ever since.  But there is now an effort under way by the trucking industry to increase that weight limit for trucks to 97,000 pounds.  The additional weight limit may cause a safety risk for other motorists on America’s highway.

With heavier trucks, not only are other drivers of motor vehicles at greater risk of injury or death, but the heavy trucks will cause more damage to the highway infrastructure. Safety advocates oppose this proposal.

With additional weight, trucks would be harder to stop in emergency situations. The fatal crash rate for heavier trucks is significantly higher than a passenger vehicle crash rate.

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Robin R. Foreman v. Gunite Corporation, 2012 IL App. (1st) 091644U.

Robin Foreman was a truck driver employed by Distribution Services, Inc. (DSI). He had a regular truck route transferring material from Gunite Corporation‘s Illinois facility to its Indiana location.

Foreman was traveling eastbound on I-290 near its intersection with the Tri-State Tollway when the load in his trailer shifted, causing the truck to roll over.

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Every day we get into cars with other drivers; however, we rarely think about the fact that we are entrusting our lives into those drivers. In the case of Cheri Razim, John Razim v. Steven R. Erickson, Zachary Stewart, 08 L 351 (Winnebago County), the plaintiff, Cheri Razim, sued the driver of her vehicle and the driver of the other vehicle involved for their cause in a motorcycle accident.

The Illinois motorcycle accident occurred on Memorial Day at a Winnebago County intersection. Razim was a passenger on Steven Erickson’s motorcycle, which was approaching the T-intersection; while Zachary Stewart was approaching from the opposite direction. Stewart made a left-hand turn in front of Erickson’s motorcycle. Erickson was unable to swerve out of the way and ended up striking the back of Stewart’s pickup with his motorcycle. Both Razim and Erickson were thrown from the motorcycle as it skid 98 feet from the site of impact.

As a result of the intersection accident, Razim sustained multiple fractures to her right arm, neck, femur, both legs, left ankle, and left foot. She was forced to undergo several surgeries, including an open reduction internal fixation of her right tibial plateau, left humerus, and right wrist. In addition, the multiple lacerations and abrasions she sustained required her to undergo plastic surgery and skin grafts on her right leg. The various procedures left Razim hospitalized for almost four weeks, with an additional six weeks needed at a rehab center. Despite her lengthy medical care, Razim is still primarily confined to a wheelchair and needs to keep her right leg straight and elevated due to venous insufficiency.

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The Illinois Appellate Court recently examined a landowner’s duty to warn visitors of an open and obvious hazard in Paul T. Swearingen v. Momentive Specialty Chemicals, Inc., No. 11-2088 (December 7, 2011). The personal injury claim examines whether a company and its employees owed a duty to a truck driver to warn him against the danger presented by a low hanging fire extinguisher system.

In March 2010, the plaintiff, Paul Swearingen, was working as a tanker truck driver for Transport Service Co. During the course of his employment, Swearingen delivered a tank of chemicals to a Momentive Specialty Chemicals facility located in Carpentersville, Illinois. After parking his truck in Momentive’s unloading bay, one of the Momentive employees asked Swearingen to open his truck’s dome.

Swearingen reports that he climbed his truck’s ladder to access the dome opening, at which point he noted some low hanging piping located a few feet above the truck’s dome. The piping was bright red and was reportedly part of Momentive’s fire extinguisher system. Swearingen proceeded to climb on top of his tanker, at which point he struck his head on the piping and fell off his truck. Swearingen filed a personal injury lawsuit against Momentive in which he claimed the chemical facility was responsible for his injuries.

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It is one of the first things you learn in driver’s ed and is repeated over and over again to new drivers: always keep your eyes on the road. However, this advice is useful not only for new drivers, but for experienced drivers, too. Take for instance the case of Benton Chapman, a 44 year-old truck driver who took his eyes off the road to adjust his radio and caused a multiple car accident on an Illinois expressway, Estate of Lafi Nofal, M.D., deceased, et al. v. Benton Chapman, Cardinal Transport, et al., 06 L 2263.

Immediately prior to the Illinois car crash, Chapman was driving a tractor-trailer truck along Illinois Interstate 55. Traffic was flowing at a reasonable speed and Mr. Chapman looked away from the road for a minute to adjust his XM Satellite radio. However, when he looked back to the roadway, Chapman discovered that the flow of traffic had slowed significantly and that he was driving way too fast.

Unfortunately, Chapman didn’t even have enough time to brake before crashing into the car immediately in front of him. Dorothy Walsh, that car’s driver, was killed as a result of the rear-end collision. However, Chapman’s truck did not stop there, but continued in its path, striking another vehicle driven by Magdi Hussein, a bobtail trailer, and three other vehicles. The severity of the Cook County highway accident caused the Stevenson Expressway to be closed for five hours.

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