Highway Car Accidents

Highways – including interstate highways, major U.S. and state roads, turnpikes and the like – are, by nature, busy roadways with a high volume of motor vehicles traveling quickly. They serve as major thoroughfares to move quickly – ideally, anyway – from one place to another. They are designed to be high-speed, high-traffic roads, carrying many cars quickly to their destinations.

Because of the speeds involved – many highways have speed limits of 70 miles per hour or more, with traffic moving even faster than that – and the number of vehicles using highways, accidents are both more likely and potentially more lethal. When traveling at high speeds, the driver has a dramatically shorter amount of time to react to traffic around them. Further, highways are prime ground for aggressive drivers, speeding, dangerous lane changes and a whole host of dangerous driving activity.

Even during rush hour and other congested-traffic periods, highways are a breeding ground for rear-end collisions as people often follow too closely and fail to pay attention to the vehicle in front of them. While such congested-traffic incidents result in less severe injuries – or no injuries at all – it all adds up to highways being veritable accident factories.

Accidents on highways are common and increasing in numbers as more drivers enter these roadways. In 2015, more than 35,000 people died in traffic accidents on U.S. roads. That number was up from 32,744 in 2014. Injuries also were up, increasing to 2.44 million people injured in traffic accidents in 2015 from 2.34 million traffic injuries in 2014. The number of police-reported crashes rose by 3.8 percent, up from 6.0 million in 2014 to 6.3 million in 2015.

Statistics support the notion that wide-open roads are ripe for fatal accidents. The rate of fatal road accidents is highest in states that have relatively low traffic density on their highways: West Virginia, Mississippi, Montana and North Dakota. Further, the raw numbers favor high-population, highway-intensive states, with the top three being Texas, with 3,044 fatal traffic accidents in 2013, California with 2,772 fatal accidents and Florida with 2,228 fatal car crashes in 2013. All three states have vast expanses of interstates and other major highways with high traffic. Florida is no different, with I-95 running top to bottom through the state, carrying millions of cars per year, and dozens of other turnpikes, highways and interstates carrying high-speed traffic.

Speeding, as you might expect, is a big factor in highway crashes. In 2016, 51 percent of traffic deaths on interstates, freeways and other major roads were at least partially a result of speeding. Speeding increases the likelihood of a crash, and also increases the likelihood that a crash will result in a fatality.

Accidents happen. In traffic, though, and particularly in high-speed traffic such as on highways, many accidents are caused by factors that go beyond “sometimes bad things happen.” Aggressive driving, speeding, inattentive driving, drowsy driving and any number of other factors can come into play. At high speeds, small mistakes are magnified, and the results can be tragic. Speed reduces the ability to slow or stop a vehicle, and that can be the difference between white knuckles and an accident.

If you are involved in a highway accident, one of the pressing questions facing you is whether someone else was at fault for your accident, giving you a means of recovering damages. Should you be faced with such a situation, you should not try to face it alone. You should consult competent legal counsel.

If you have been involved in a highway accident in the Miami area, you should consult an attorney to determine what your rights are. It is possible the accident was not your fault, and if this is the case, we can help work to recover compensation for your damages.

The attorneys of Gerson & Schwartz can assist you in protecting your rights when you are involved in such an accident. You can reach us at (877) 475-2905 or through our website.