Larger motor vehicles, especially trucks can create a greater safety risk for other drivers on the highway. Especially for passenger cars, sedans and other smaller motor vehicles. According to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s 2014 FARS (“Fatality Analysis Reporting System”) report, one out of every ten highway deaths were involved in a truck-related accident. This means that when a truck is part of a car crash, the risk of death for drivers and passengers goes up. A troubling statistic but the reality of highway safety.

Why is this? In many cases, it is due to the sheer size advantage trucks and larger vehicles have over passenger cars. Occupants of smaller passenger cars are more vulnerable to serious injuries when a truck or semi crashes into them. Trucks can weigh twenty to thirty times more than passenger cars. Furthermore, the ground clearance of a passenger car does not really even compare to that of a truck.

Another factor in trucks creating a greater risk of danger to highway drivers is their ability to brake. While being smaller makes it easier for passenger cars to brake, this is the opposite for truck. In fact, it the distance it takes for a truck to brake and stop can be twenty to forty percent farther than a car.

Further statistics are even more troubling. In 2014, there were 3,660 people who died in large truck crashes. Well over half of these deaths were people in the passenger car and not the large truck at 68 percent.

Drivers of passenger cars on highways should be extra cautious when approaching or passing a large truck or semi. The statistics speak for themselves. For more information, talk to an experienced car accident lawyer in Alabama.