Virginia State Police reported May 28 that a tractor trailer driver was killed on I-81 in Rockbridge County. They said the 44 year old truck driver was driving his rig south on the interstate at 12:30 PM Monday. 

Police said the truck driver made an unsafe lane change and struck an SUV that was in the left lane. The SUV overturned and injured the two people inside. State police said the tractor trailer ran off the left side of the road and into two trees.

The two SUV passengers were taken to a local hospital to be treated for non-life-threatening injuries.

Our View

Tractor trailers and cars must share the same roads, and there are rules of the highway that need to be followed so everyone is safe. One of the problems with tractor trailers is they have large blind spots. Also, truckers have tight schedules to get their freight into the dock, and this can cause them to change lanes aggressively to save time. Unfortunately, as this truck accident above makes clear, an unsafe lane change can cause a serious accident.

If you are driving on the highway and see a truck doing any of the following, be sure to keep your distance:

• Change lanes but fail to signal
• Change lanes at high speed
• Change lanes in middle of interseciton
• Fail to check their blind spot
• Weaving

Our Virginia truck crash attorneys want to remind everyone that truckers have a responsibility as the holder of a CDEL to drive in a safe manner no matter what the deadline is. When they do not drive safely, they can put their own and other people’s lives at risk. We hope the two injured SUV passengers recover quickly from their injuries.

In cases where the negligence of a truck driver kills another person, it is possible to file a wrongful death lawsuit, such as this $2.25 million truck crash settlement we negotiated recently. 

The trucker sideswiped our client on the side of the interstate when he was checking his truck load. It turned out the truck driver who was negligent had a medical condition that he should have been treating that caused him to have a medical incident and hit our client. Truckers and their companies have a responsibility to stay healthy and fit to drive. When they do not do so, grieving family members of the crash victim may be entitled to compensation.