TN truck accident highlights KY trucking employer’s failures

Truck safety is an important issue for all of us, because we all use the road and are all at risk when commercial truck drivers fail to follow safety regulations and exercise caution on the road. When a truck driver does cause an accident, it is certainly important for accident victims to work with an experienced advocate to closely examine the case to determine the accident victim’s avenues for seeking recovery.

This means identifying and pursuing all parties responsible for the crash. There is, first of all, the truck driver him- or herself, that goes without saying. In many cases, though, the employer may also be at fault. A truck accident that occurred in Tennessee over the summer is an example of this. The crash, which killed six individuals, was caused by a Kentucky driver who was found not only to have been fatigued at the time of the accident, but also high on methamphetamine.

According to the National Transportation Safety Board, the driver had gone 40 hours without “sustained rest” before speeding through a construction work zone and striking a small car at close to 80 miles per hour. As a result of that initial impact, a total of seven other vehicles ended up being struck and 18 people were involved.

The accident was not only caused by the reckless actions of the truck driver, but also by his employer. According to investigators, the employer’s screening process did not look into his record enough to discover that he had been terminated from a previous trucking job due to illegal drug use.

We’ll continue looking at this story in our next post, and what an experienced attorney can do to help truck accident victims hold trucking employers accountable for their employer’s negligence.