Curbing the Increasing Number of Hit-and-run Accidents

What are the odds of you getting ran over by a vehicle when you are walking down the street? You’d normally think that you are safe because California’s road network is well-engineered and are friendly to pedestrians. However, it will make you wonder how pedestrians get involved in accidents given that California’s roads are pedestrian-friendly.

Hit and run incidents

Every year, thousands of hit-and-run incidents have been recorded in the country. Every year, thousands of people get involved in accidents that have caused injuries, and even death to some. Hit and run incidents are some of the most common causes of injuries and deaths among American pedestrians. Just recently, a pedestrian was struck, and killed in Santa Ana, California. According to authorities, the 88 year old Joseph Rudolph has been run over by a vehicle driven by 33 year old Michael Truong Pham of Garden Grove. Investigators even went to as far as closing sections of some of the roads near where the accident happened to quickly investigate about the incident. They added that there have been nine recorded fatal accidents in 2013; two more than the recorded seven incidents in the area in 2012.

Preventing hit and run incidents

Types of Motor Vehicle Accidents That Commuters Face in California

Traveling within the State of California can be done using either two options. While a lot of people prefer using motor vehicles such as automobiles, motorcycles, and bicycles to get from point A to point B, there are others who instead go out as pedestrians and get to a destination using public transportation. As it is, commuting is both a safer and faster way to move around California cities due to its reliability.

Most commuters often do not own cars or other motor vehicles, which is why they choose public transport as their means for travel. But then, even those who own motor vehicles sometimes take buses, trains, and other forms of public transportation, especially for various reasons. For one, they may opt not to use their own vehicles due to heavy traffic. As we all know, cities in California are notorious when it comes to heavy traffic congestion, as well as occurrences of accidents.

This is the reason why commuters, regardless if they own a car or not, find public transport a great option if they want to evade traffic jams, as well as unfortunate accidents. However, that is not always the case. Commuters, like many motorists in California, also face dangers that would most definitely result in accidents.

As it is, mishaps involving public transportation can be devastating given the number of people involved. Depending on the severity and impact of the accident, injuries may range from serious to fatal. Moreover, most of the accidents involve negligence, or the failure to exercise reasonable care towards others, particularly the passengers riding vehicles for public utility.

Meanwhile, here are some of the types of motor vehicle accidents that commuters face in California:

Daydreaming More Dangerous Than Using Mobile Phones While Driving – Study

Distracted driving is one of the many factors for the occurrence of motor vehicle crashes and their resulting injuries and deaths among drivers, passengers, and other road users in the United States. Aside from driving while being intoxicated, as well as driving recklessly and aggressively, being distracted while driving has always been linked to a lot of fatalities in vehicle crashes in the nation.

In fact, people who died in distraction-affected crashes increased in 2011 by 1.9 percent, from 3,267 in 2010 to 3,331 the next year. However, the number of injuries in the same crashes otherwise decreased by 7 percent, from an estimated 416,000 people in 2010 to approximately 387,000 people the next year.

The use of cell phones while driving, as well as fidgeting on the car stereo and picking up something off the car floor, are some of the common distractions that could lead to an accident on the road. Even daydreaming is considered a distraction while driving; in fact, a study revealed that doing so is even more dangerous than the common distracted driving-related activities.

A Yahoo! Autos article shed some light with regards to the dangers of daydreaming for drivers. According to the article, a study made by the researchers from the Erie Insurance Group found that 1 in 10 were due to using cell phones or doing other activities while driving.

Surprisingly, of the more than 65,000 fatal crashes from 2010 to 2011 analyzed in the study, it was found that about 62 percent of them were daydreaming; five times as many as talking or texting with someone using a cell phone. Said statistics were taken from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

Car Manufacturers as Possible Defendants in a Car Accident Case

Motor vehicle accidents mostly take the bulk of personal injury claims being filed by injured parties in California. As it is with any personal injury claims, injuries and deaths caused by such unfortunate occurrences often stem from the legal theory of negligence. When a person gets injured in a road collision, he or she has the right to claim damages from the person believed to have caused the incident. For the injured party to obtain compensation for the damages incurred in the accident, he or she must have enough proof that the other party was negligent and responsible for what happened.

Indeed, the question of fault is always a certainty when it comes to these claims. Every injured party in most personal injury claims often blame the other driver involved; however, it is not all the time the latter may have contributed to the claiming party’s injuries. As it is, the liable parties do not always involve individuals, but rather entities.

This is why it is important for injured parties to seek a Los Angeles personal injury attorney. That way, the claim can determine who is really at fault for the accident and for the injured party’s damages. The lawyer can take a look at the circumstances of the accident, if it is really the negligence of the other driver that is to blame for the accident or something else.

That something else could be the car manufacturer of the vehicle used before the accident happened. As it is, vehicle or vehiclepart defects can often cause an accident that might not have occurred otherwise. Whether it is a manufacturer o design defect, these are just some of the important vehicle items that could go wrong and may contribute to an accident: