Bucks County Truck Accident Lawyer
For Bucks County residents who drive regularly on the Pennsylvania Turnpike or other highways to get to work, there are serious risks of trucking accidents. While large truck crashes can happen on almost any road, they tend to be more serious and more common on highways.
Due to the weight of large trucks, accidents involving these vehicles often result in severe and fatal injuries to passengers in smaller vehicles. At The Levin Firm Personal Injury Lawyers, we are devastated by the severity of truck accidents in Pennsylvania, and we are dedicated to helping injury victims seek compensation for their losses.
Depending on the specific facts of your case, there may be several parties liable for the dangerous truck accident that caused your injuries. An aggressive Bucks County truck accident attorney at The Levin Firm Personal Injury Lawyers can assess the details of your case and can talk you through your options for seeking compensation.
Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you with your truck accident lawsuit.
Why You Need a Bucks County Truck Accident Lawyer
If you have been hurt in a truck accident in Feasterville or elsewhere in Bucks County, you need a dedicated, experienced truck accident lawyer to help you seek the compensation you need and deserve.
Our knowledgeable truck accident lawyers can:
- Independently investigate the accident to prove how it occurred and establish who was really at fault for the accident.
- Wade through the complex web of entities that could be liable, including the truck driver, the trucking company or truck owner, the freight company, the truck manufacturer, and others.
- Help you peel back the multiple layers of insurance coverage that many trucking companies possess.
- Aggressively negotiate on your behalf to try to obtain a settlement that provides you with full compensation for your losses.
- Fight back against the trucking companies’ efforts to refuse responsibility for the accident or unfairly limit the amount of money they have to pay you.
If a settlement of your claims is not possible, a truck accident lawyer is a critical ally as you pursue your claim through the civil lawsuit system. Your attorney will ensure that your lawsuit is timely filed and properly prosecuted.
If your case does go to trial, our experienced truck accident lawyers will be ready to persuasively advocate on your behalf to seek a verdict and judgment that provides you with the compensation you need and deserve.
How Are Large Truck Accidents Different from Other Collisions?
According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), crashes with large trucks tend to be more severe than other crashes when smaller passenger vehicles are involved.
As the IIHS explains, occupants of passenger vehicles are at serious risk of life-threatening injuries, since “trucks often weigh 20-30 times as much as passenger cars and are taller with greater ground clearance, which can result in smaller vehicles underriding trucks in crashes.” In other words, passenger vehicles do not provide sufficient protection for occupants when there is a collision with a tractor-trailer or other heavy truck.
Resolving a large truck accident claim is often different from other types of crash cases because large truck accidents cause much more severe injuries. As a result, injured parties often must undergo extensive and expensive medical treatment. It may be necessary to include future medical expenses into any settlement, which can cause conflict as the parties fight over what reasonable future medical expenses will cost.
These accidents also differ from other collisions when injured parties try to seek compensation. Unlike a passenger vehicle, which is typically driven by its owner with typically only one insurance policy, multiple parties are involved with large trucks. Parties responsible for the truck might include the truck driver, the trucking company, the freight company, the truck mechanics, and others. These companies might also have multiple layers of insurance coverage that can be hard to uncover, as the company might claim that only an initial layer of insurance coverage is available to pay an injured party’s claims.
As you can see, truck accidents are very serious and often result in fatal injuries. If you sustained injuries in a truck collision, you should speak with our Bucks County truck accident attorneys as soon as possible.
Compensation Available After a Truck Accident
If you have been injured in a truck accident, you might be entitled to various forms of compensation for your physical and psychological injuries, as well as your property damage.
Personal injury compensation typically falls into two categories: economic damages and non-economic damages. Economic damages are intended to compensate an injured person for specific financial losses, which can be calculated from bills, invoices, paystubs, and other financial documents. Non-economic damages are intended to compensate an injured person for more subjective losses that cannot be readily calculated by referencing financial documents.
Examples of economic damages include:
- Past and future medical expenses, such as hospital visits, doctor’s office visits, surgeries, physical therapy, prescription medication, durable medical equipment, and renovations to your home to accommodate disabilities caused by your injuries.
- Past and future lost income, such as income or wages lost due to time from work missed during your recovery, and including the difference between your pre- and post-accident income levels if your injuries cause you to be unable to return to your prior job duties.
Examples of non-economic damages include:
- Pain and suffering, which includes physical and emotional/mental distress caused by your injuries
- Loss of quality of life stemming from your inability to perform tasks of daily living and inability to participate in activities you enjoyed before your accident
- Loss of companionship and consortium, which compensates your spouse and your immediate family for the loss of your company and services to your household and family
You may also be entitled to receive compensation for property damage you’ve suffered in the truck accident. You may be compensated for the costs to repair your damaged vehicle or for the cash value of the vehicle if it is totaled in the accident. Compensation might also cover damage to any other property inside your vehicle.
Who Can Be Sued for a Bucks County Truck Crash?
Given the many different causes of truck accidents, it might be possible to file a truck accident lawsuit against multiple parties, including:
- Truck driver
- Owner of the truck
- Owner of the trailer
- Employer of the driver
- Company that loaded the freight onto the truck
- Cargo owner
- Designer of defective truck parts
- Manufacturer of defective truck parts
- Truck maintenance company
Some potential defendants may have better insurance coverage of “deeper pockets” than others. The parties that can be sued depends entirely on the facts of your specific case and the causes of the truck accident. Our dedicated truck accident attorneys can analyze the facts of your case to help you determine potential defendants in your lawsuit.
File Your Lawsuit Within Two Years
Under Pennsylvania law, the statute of limitations for a truck accident claim is two years. This means an injury victim must file his or her lawsuit within two years from the date of the accident to be eligible to receive compensation. Do not wait to discuss your case with a Bucks County personal injury attorney.
Causes of Truck Accidents in Bucks County, Pennsylvania
What causes most truck crashes in Feasterville and Bucks County? The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) conducted a large truck crash causation study, which determined that most trucking collisions are caused by one of the following:
- Truck driver’s negligence (including aggressive driving, distracted driving, impaired driving, and drowsy driving)
- Vehicle maintenance problems (such as tire maintenance issues or poor brake maintenance)
- Auto defects (such as defects in the vehicle’s brake system)
- Improper loading of truck contents
- Poor road conditions
- Inclement weather
Sometimes different factors work together to cause a serious truck accident, while sometimes the cause of a collision is singular.
While it might be difficult to file a claim if the crash resulted from inclement weather (such as heavy fog or icy roadways), plaintiffs might be able to prove that the driver or another party was negligent in failing to drive appropriately under the conditions.
If a driver violated the hours-of-service safety regulations (which specify how long a trucker can be on the road without taking a break), you might be able to show that the trucker engaged in drowsy driving and is liable for the accident.
Statistics from the IIHS on the Seriousness of Trucking Crashes:
- A total of 4,102 individuals died in large truck crashes in a single recent year.
- 17 percent of these fatalities were occupants of large trucks, 68 percent of fatalities in large truck accidents were occupants of passenger vehicles, while another 14 percent of fatalities were motorcycle riders, bicycle riders, and pedestrians.
- In accidents specifically involving a large truck and a passenger vehicle, 97 percent of deaths were those of the occupants of the passenger vehicle, while only 3 percent of deaths were those of an occupant of the large truck.
- 12 percent of all passenger vehicle occupant deaths and 22 percent of passenger vehicle occupant deaths in multiple-vehicle accidents involved a crash with a large truck.
- The majority of large truck crash deaths occur on highways, with 32 percent of deaths occurring on interstates and freeways, and 52 percent of deaths occurring on major roads other than interstates and freeways.
- Accidents between large trucks and passenger vehicles were most likely to be head-on collisions, with 31 percent of fatal accidents arising from head-on collisions between large trucks and passenger vehicles. Large trucks were also likely to “T-bone” passenger vehicles, with such accidents, representing 25 percent of fatal accidents.
- The number of fatalities in large truck accidents in 2017 was 30 percent higher than figures in 2009, which was the lowest figure since statistics began to be collected in 1975.
Contact Our Bucks County Truck Accident Attorneys
If you sustained serious injuries in a truck accident in Bucks County, and someone else was at fault, you deserve to seek financial compensation. When a truck accident happens, injury victims can become severely disabled, requiring months and years of costly medical treatment, not to mention the inability to work and to earn wages.
At The Levin Firm Personal Injury Lawyers, a truck accident lawyer in Bucks County can help you to seek damages to compensate you for your hospital bills, lost wages, and even for the pain and suffering you have experienced as a result of the crash. Contact us today to discuss your case and to learn more about how we can assist you with your truck accident lawsuit.