Motor vehicle accidents can cause serious injuries and even death, and accidents involving trucks are even more likely to cause more injuries, damage, and fatalities than those involving only passenger vehicles. There are some trucks which increase the amount of harm that can result from an accident even more, because of the cargo that they contain. Accidents involving dangerous cargo happen more often than you might think. For example, over three thousand trucking accidents which happened between 2004 and 2013 involved some sort of hazardous cargo. The accidents caused a combined amount of four hundred and fifty million dollars in damage, ninety one fatalities, and many serious injuries.
The accident scenarios which can occur when hazardous cargo is involved resemble regular accidents, except that additional emergency response personnel may need to help clean up the accident scene and additional precautions, such as road closures and evacuations, may be required to keep people safe. For example, when one tanker truck collided with a pickup truck, it flipped over and spilled some of the corrosive liquid that it was carrying. Hazmat crews reported to the accident scene, and they had to close the road for a few hours while they cleaned up the spilled chemicals. As a precaution, area residents were told to stay indoors, so that they would not inhale the noxious fumes from the chemical spill.
A similar situation occurred when a tractor trailer which was carrying naphtha, a flammable substance, overturned. Traffic was diverted from the area of the crash for twelve hours, as emergency response crews cleaned up the chemical spill and removed the wreckage. Sometimes, there are even incidents where no collision occurs, yet an emergency situation is created because something else happens which creates a danger to people in or near the area where the truck carrying hazardous cargo is located. One such incident occurred when the refrigeration system of a FedEx Custom Critical delivery truck stopped working. The truck’s refrigerated trailer was loaded with two hundred gallons of liquefied peroxide, which becomes flammable at temperatures above fifty degrees and is highly explosive. The failure of the truck’s refrigeration system therefore created a risk that the liquefied peroxide would reach too high of a temperature, which could result in a fire or an explosion. The truck driver stopped the truck as soon as he became aware of the problem, and he called for help. Emergency response crews rushed to the scene and secured the area. They even evacuated a nearby business in the process. Fortunately, this potentially dangerous situation was managed without incident.
Giddens Law Firm, P.A.: Mississippi Trucking Accident Attorneys
If you were hurt or someone in your family was killed in a trucking accident involving hazardous cargo, the Mississippi Trucking Accident Attorneys at the Giddens Law Firm, P.A. can help you to pursue the financial recovery that you deserve. To learn more about how we can help you, please call our office today, at (601) 355-2022.