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TRUCK ACCIDENTS
The NCSA (National Center for Statistical Analysis) compiled statistics on significant truck accidents in the United States in one year. The study found that almost five thousand truck accidents resulted in fatalities. The study also found that 68% of these accidents occurred in rural areas. This goes against the common assumption that congested areas experience more truck accidents. The study found that 78% of truck accidents happened on weekdays, and 66% occurred during daylight hours. While it might seem that daylight driving is safer than nighttime, the high percentage may be because there are more cars on the road with trucks. There are many reasons for truck accidents, including driver impairment. This study found that only 1% of fatal accidents were due to DUI.
Instead, a higher accident rate was found among those truck drivers who had been convicted of speeding. This study found that 27% of the truck drivers involved in the accident had a least one earlier speeding conviction. In this study on truck accidents, these were the five states with the highest truck accident fatalities: Texas, Florida, California, Pennsylvania, and Georgia. The statistics for the previous year also had these as the top states.
It is difficult to analyze these numbers and determine why these states are at the top of the list. This is especially true since the study also found the most significant percentage of accidents involved truck drivers with speeding convictions. However, that was still only 27%, meaning almost three-thirds of the fatal accidents had other causes. These remaining truck accidents could have happened for any of the other usual causes. Many may be due to poorly constructed roads. This cause might explain why the same states occupy the top spots in successive years. Numerous roads around the country are notorious for accidents, including truck collisions. Another cause could be bad weather. While often winter weather is thought to be more dangerous, only one of these five states, Pennsylvania, and northern California, are areas that have significant annual snowfall. The other three states and southern California are generally warm-weather states. They experience terrible rain storms, including hurricanes, so some of these fatal truck accidents may be weather related. One other reason is an unsafe driver.
Often in accidents involving large trucks and cars, the driver of the smaller vehicle committed the action that caused the casualties. Some car drivers do dangerous maneuvers near truck drivers, which results in fatal accidents. They drive too close to trucks, sometimes pulling into their lane without sufficient headway. Some move into the space to the right of a car when it makes a wide right turn. Often these drivers believe they have the skill to get by the slower-moving truck. While these individual state fatality numbers may not seem high, there are more than one hundred thousand injuries yearly due to truck accidents. This illustrates the genuine danger of truck accidents in the US.