When driving on the public roads, we have the right to expect that other drivers will follow the basic safe-driving rules of the road. If we can’t expect this, driving in the U.S. would be chaos. When other drivers chose not to follow the safe-driving rules of the road, crashes occur and peoples’ lives are shattered. The risk of severe injury or death is significantly increased when the accident involves a semi or tractor-trailer rig. Although the drivers of these big rigs are supposed to be professional drivers, we all know that many of these drivers are not qualified to be behind the wheel of a 60,000+ pound truck. How many times have you driven through the Virgin River gorge being scared to pass a semi because the semi is weaving in and out of its lane? Just last weekend, on July 6th, the I-15 corridor between Utah and Arizona, was littered with Flamin’ Hot Cheetos when, according to news sources, a 2019 Freightliner “failed to observed that traffic was stopped in both lanes” and hit the rear of another tractor-trailer. Thank goodness the 2019 Freightliner did not plow into the back of another car.
Bad things happen to those we know and love when they are involved in a crash involving a tractor trailer. These big rig crashes happen far too frequently. In 2017, there were “approximately 450,000 police-reported crashes involving large trucks, … there were 4,237 … fatal crashes and 344,000 … injury crashes.” Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration Crash Statistics. “Fatal crashes involving large trucks often occur in rural areas and on Interstate highways. Approximately 57 percent of all fatal crashes involving large trucks occurred in rural areas, 27 percent occurred on Interstate highways, and 13 percent fell into both categories by occurring on rural Interstate highways.”
We all need to work together to educate our loved ones about the risks of driving. Driving is dangerous. The roads only will become safer as we focus more on our driving and less on distractions.
