Personal Injury Attorney

How Does Driver Fatigue Contribute to Truck Accident?

Some of the most common causes of truck accidents include intoxication, reckless driving, and defective vehicles. Often, the cause of a commercial vehicle accident can be determined through a sobriety test, or by analyzing the data from the truck’s black box (such as in cases of speeding). But there is another common truck contributor that could be difficult to prove: Driver fatigue.

It may seem like proving driver fatigue will be a “their word vs. your word” situation, however, there are concrete ways to demonstrate the level of fatigue a truck driver may have been experiencing at the time of an accident.

If you’ve ever driven on a long trip, or even commuted to work on minimal sleep, you’ve experienced driver fatigue. When you’re tired, it is difficult to focus on any task, and especially one as complicated as driving.

Driver fatigue can lead to behaviors such as:

  • Slowed reaction time, and did not braking when needed
  • Failure to check mirrors
  • Not using turn signals
  • Swerving or drifting into other lanes

Truck driving is much more complex than driving a car. Truckers must be completely alert to handle large rigs correctly — driver fatigue prevents this.

Evidence of Truck Driver Fatigue

Evidence of how long a trucker was driving is one of the most tangible ways to show that fatigue contributed to an accident. Truck drivers travel for long hours, with very few breaks to rest. There are legal caps on the number of hours truckers are allowed to drive, and exceeding those hours can be used as evidence of fatigue.

Data from a truck’s black box can also prove fatigued. Failure to break, for example, can be shown in a black box and used as evidence to prove driver fatigue.

If you were injured in a truck accident, contact B&D Law Group today. Our attorneys are available to discuss your rights — call (888) 977-2238 or send us a message to get started with a free consultation.