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More than two million people in the U.S. fall asleep while driving every single week, which translates to over a million accidents a year directly related to drowsy driving. One of the worst categories of culprits, unfortunately, are the truckers that drive food, goods, and materials cross country without adequate employer-mandated time for rest and sleep. This results in catastrophic truck accidents in Los Angeles and elsewhere, many of which could be avoided if truckers were not driving while drowsy.
Sleep is incredibly important to staying alert. If you’ve ever been driving home late at night after a shift at work, or a party that went overly long, you have probably experienced drowsy driving for yourself. Most people have had at least one instance of falling asleep at the wheel and jolting awake at the sound of a horn or the car’s vibration from straying off the road into dirt and grass. While it’s dangerous for a driver of any type of vehicle to fall asleep at the wheel, it’s particularly dangerous when the driver is steering several tons of commercial truck and its contents.
Statistics show that long-distance truckers have two-to-five times greater risk of an accident than the average driver. In addition, an average of 4.5 other people on the roadway are killed when a long-distance truck driver is involved in a fatal accident. While not all of these accidents are due to driving while drowsy, sleep-deprivation is a serious contributor to these statistics.
The truck accident attorneys at the Los Angeles office of Steinberg Injury Lawyers have seen it all and are experienced in representing victims of trucking accidents. In many cases, the party ultimately held responsible is the company that employed the truck driver and pressured them to continue driving while drowsy or had official or unofficial policies in place that discouraged adequate rest and contributed directly to the circumstances leading to the crash. If you or a loved one has been injured, please call the Los Angeles truck accident attorneys at Steinberg Injury Lawyers to see how we can help you with no upfront costs. A free consultation is always available if you’ve been injured in a truck accident. Call us today at 1-800-350-8888 to find out more information about your right to compensation.
