California commercial truck drivers are the third most dangerous in the country, according to data from Verizon Connect. The ranking is based on safety factors such as braking, cornering and acceleration.
Verizon Connect, a fleet management systems provider, analyzed the behaviors of more than 6,200 commercial truck driving clients from Oct. 2015 through Sept. 2017. The study included a range of vehicles, from light vans and pickups to tractor-trailers, and it considered factors like fatalities per vehicle miles driven, average speeding incidents per mile and average speeding incidents per day. The study found that states along the East Coast tend to have the least deaths and speeding incidents in the nation. Rhode Island was the safest state, followed by Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont and New York. Meanwhile, the most dangerous state was Montana, followed by Wyoming, South Dakota, Kentucky and Mississippi.
The study also ranked the states with the safest and most dangerous commercial drivers. The safest drivers were in North Dakota, followed by Maine, Nebraska, Vermont and Wyoming. On the other hand, the most dangerous drivers were located in Utah, followed by Georgia, California, Alabama and Texas.
Truck accidents can be caused by various factors, including speeding, inattentive truck drivers, unqualified truck drivers and truck driver fatigue. When someone is injured in a truck crash caused by truck driver negligence, he or she has the right to pursue compensation in court. With the help of a personal injury attorney, a victim might be able to show that a truck driver and/or a trucking company was responsible for the crash. This might lead to a financial settlement that covers medical expenses, pain and suffering, lost wages and property loss.
Source: Fleet Owner, “Trucking and work trucks: Where safety is and isn’t,” Aaron Marsh, June 28, 2018