Between 20% and 30% of all car accidents and truck accidents are caused by distracted drivers, according to statistics from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Proliferate cell phone use has made talking and texting on the phone the primary cause of driver distraction and a significant contributing factor in Philadelphia personal injury car accidents. According to a NHTSA study, Philadelphia drivers are 1.3 times more likely to be involved in a collision while talking on a phone. The risk more than doubles when drivers are dialing a cell phone and increases even further when Philadelphia drivers text while on the road.
Concern over the impact of cell phone use on Philadelphia personal injury car accidents caused the city to enact a cell phone law last November banning talking, dialing and texting on a handheld device while driving a motor vehicle. The severity of the problem prompted the Pennsylvania House to approve a statewide bill that, if passed by the Senate as expected, will strictly ban talking and texting on handheld cell phones while driving (see our January 27 post). National accidents attributed to cell phone use led the U.S. Department of Transportation to recently ban texting by commercial truck and bus drivers.
In a Philadelphia cell phone-related car accident late last year, a van driver ran a red light while talking on his cell phone, crashing into the front of a SEPTA bus. The crash caused the bus to lose control and ram into an El support column. Eighteen people were injured. A passenger in a SUV driven by a Pennsylvania resident suffered catastrophic injuries when the driver collided with another vehicle while texting. A truck driver talking on his cell phone on I-70 rammed a car in bad weather, killing a mother and two children.
If you are involved in a Philadelphia car or truck accident, whether or not cell phone use played a possible role, contact a Philadelphia personal injury lawyer about your rights.
