If you look up the weight of your personal car, it is probably around 4,000 pounds. Certainly, there are lighter vehicles, and it is also true that electric vehicles tend to weigh a bit more, so the average car is growing heavier – but, it should be somewhere in this range.
If you look at the maximum weight for a semi truck, however, it is set at 80,000 pounds. That is 50 times more than your car weighs. This huge difference can cause some serious risks for you on the road.
More severe injuries
First and foremost, a semi-truck often causes more severe injuries for a person in a passenger car. The physics of an accident simply dictate that smaller and lighter objects are going to take more of the force than larger and heavier objects. People in a 4,000-pound car are going to have more force enacted on them and suffer more significant injuries in most cases.
Longer stopping distances
Another issue that this creates is that semi-trucks take roughly twice as far to stop as passenger cars. Truck drivers do not have nearly as much room for error. Even breaking just a few feet too late might mean that the driver cannot stop in time. You will often see rear-end accidents if there is an unexpected change in traffic and a driver doesn’t react quickly enough.
What are your options?
If you’ve been injured in a semi-truck accident, you need to know how to explore all of your options to seek financial compensation. This could include considering compensation from the trucking company and not just the driver.