More than half a million truck accidents occur in the U.S. each year – and around 5,000 people are killed.
Many of these truck accidents are in Florida, with its heavy highway traffic generated by the agricultural, manufacturing and tourism industries.
In fact, Florida is one of the top five states for truck accidents. The others are California, Texas, Georgia and Pennsylvania.
Trucks in Florida collide with passenger cars, pedestrians and motorcycles. Sometimes they even run into each other.
That’s what happened March 21 on Interstate 75 in Pasco County. A dump truck crashed into a U.S. Postal Service tractor-trailer that was loaded with mail. Both trucks burst into flames.
A postal crew arrived on the scene to try and salvage what they could of the smoldering parcels and packets of letters. Highway workers were called in to repair the damaged asphalt.
According to an NBC News account of the accident, Florida Highway Patrol Sgt. Steve Gaskins stated that the truck was heading south along the outside lane of I-75 when it hit a crash attenuator, partially jackknifing at approximately 6:30 a.m.
The dump truck that was following behind the vehicle was unable to stop in time, thus rear-ending the tractor-trailer. Both drivers were brought to nearby hospitals for observation.
Here are some truck accident statistics from the U.S. Department of Transportation:
- There are an estimated 15.5 million trucks operating nationwide. Two million trucks are tractor-trailers.
- There are approximately 3.5 million truck drivers in the country.
- One in nine drivers are independent operators.
- Sixty-eight (68) percent of truck accidents occur during the daytime.
- Seventy-eight (78) percent of truck accidents occur on weekends.
- In fatal truck accidents, it is almost always the driver of the other vehicle who is killed (98 percent of the time).
Sources:
- NBC News
- Faster Truck.com http://fastertruck.com/pages/Semi-Truck-Accidents-News-Reports.html
