Speeding Teen Driver

A carload of teenagers, on holiday, out way past curfew, traveling at a high rate of speed and you have the makings of a tragic ending. The driver lost control of the vehicle, left the road and slammed head-on into a tree in a residential neighborhood.

A 17-year-old passenger died at the scene and an 18-year-old girl and a 15-year-old boy were transported to Vanderbilt medical Center with non-life threatening injuries. The 16-year-old driver fled the scene leaving his friends to fend for themselves. Fleeing the scene insured that would probably be a series of traffic citations will now become criminal charges. Smart move by the teen driver.

I’ve discussed here many times the sad fact that motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for U.S. teens, accounting for more than one in three deaths in this age group. Among experienced Tennessee automobile accident attorneys, the Governor’s Highway Safety Association (GHSA), the National Highway Safety Administration (NHTSA), and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), it is generally agreed that teen drivers have the highest crash risk of any age group.

Per mile, the crash rate for 16 year-old drivers is 10 times the rate for drivers between 30 and 59. The basic reasons behind this statistic are obvious, teen drivers have no experience with the myriad issues faced by drivers with experience, furthermore, they are immature and often takes risks, most often speeding, and are easily distracted which contribute to the increased death rate.

The basic reasons behind this statistic are obvious, teen drivers have no experience with the myriad issues faced by drivers with experience, furthermore, they are immature and often takes risks, most often speeding, and are easily distracted which contribute to the increased death rate. The main question here is, why were these underage teenagers out driving around at 3:30 am?

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a teen driver contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident attorneys at Phillip Miller & Associates and find out about your rights and remedies.

Practice Teen Driver Safety

A message to teen drivers from the National Highway Traffic Administration for National Teen Driver Safety Week (Oct. 17-24, 2010; Keep your hands on the wheel, your eyes on the road, and both (hands and eyes) away from your cell phone while driving.

The NHTSA has developed a multi-tiered strategy to prevent motor vehicle-related deaths and injuries among teen drivers: increasing seat belt use, implementing graduated driver licensing, reducing teens’ access to alcohol, and parental responsibility.

The heart of NHTSA’s mission is keeping families safe on America’s roadways. Young drivers, ages 15- to 20-years old, are especially vulnerable to death and injury on our roadways – traffic crashes are the leading cause of death for teenagers in America. Mile for mile, teenagers are involved in three times as many fatal crashes as all other drivers.

Research shows which behaviors contribute to teen-related crashes. Inexperience and immaturity combined with speed, drinking and driving, not wearing seat belts, distracted driving (cell phone use, loud music, other teen passengers, etc.), drowsy driving, nighttime driving, and other drug use aggravate this problem.

In addition to laws, safety experts agree that parents play a key role in helping teens become good drivers. Parents should not rely solely on drivers education classes to teach good driving habits and should restrict night driving, restrict the numbers of passengers riding with their teen, supervise practice driving, always require use of seat belts and choose vehicles for safety, not image. Parents can also set a good example by practicing safe driving techniques themselves.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a teen driver contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident attorneys at Phillip Miller & Associates and find out about your rights and remedies.

Drinking And Driving

An Anderson County Tennessee man died this past Saturday after being on life support for a week. According to Tennessee State Trooper reports on the accident that lead to this death, the 24-year-old man lost control of his vehicle as he rounded a curve. His vehicle left the road, ran up a bank into a cemetery, hit several headstones and flipped several times before coming to rest. The man was not wearing his seatbelt and was ejected from the car as it flipped. Investigators believe that alcohol, distraction and speed combined to cause the crash. My prayers go out to the family and friends of this young man.

Drinking, speeding and not wearing a seatbelt is a strong and deadly cocktail which almost always results in an unhappy ending. Drunk driving is one of America’s deadliest crimes. In Tennessee in 2008, 327 people were killed in crashes where the driver or motorcyclist had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or higher.

As an experienced Tennessee car accident lawyer I want to remind you that driving with a BAC of .08 or higher is illegal in every state. If you follow my blog you will see that in Tennessee we continue to see a tragic number of people with debilitating injuries and deaths as a result of impaired driving.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a drunk or speeding driver, contact the experienced Nashville auto accident attorneys at Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of a free consultation to find out about your rights and remedies.

Another Distracted Driver Fatality

There was a fatal one-car crash in Shelby County Tennessee that left a 27-year-old mother dead and her 6-year-old son seriously injured. As an experienced Tennessee auto accident attorney, I see this set of facts all too often. She was driving down the road and suddenly veered to the right, left the road and hit something solid and died.

Both parties were wearing their seatbelts and police believe that speed was a factor in the crash. I’m going on the simple facts of the article but I believe that there was another cause and that it was driver distraction. All too often parents driving with children in the car take their eyes and their attention off the road to deal with the child in the backseat. The distraction only needs to be for one second and at high speed it’s all over.

The lesson here is that we all need to respect the posted speed limits, the posted limits are not simply suggestions, and we need to avoid any type of distracting activity that requires us to refocus our attention  to the task at hand.

If you or a loved one are injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident caused by a negligent driver contact the experienced Nashville auto accident lawyers at Phillip Miller & Associates, you will be glad you did.

Teach Teen Driving Safety

A couple of recent articles about teen driving caught my attention and I thought I might use this opportunity to share some tragic facts about teen fatalities. The first story was at the website of Volunteer TV WVLT in Knoxville. Three teen drivers in a car, lost control,  left the road and crashed into a tree. According to police reports all three of the teens are going to recover even though a young girl was trapped in the vehicle for over an hour. The second story in the Johnson City Press involved an underage teen girl, 15, who was driving a car when she lost control and hit a ditch and came to a stop against a culvert.

Although the facts at slim in both reports, there can only be a couple of reasons for these crashes. I suspect that speed, inexperience and driver distraction created a potentially fatal mix.

According to the Center for Injury Research and Prevention young drivers ages 16-20 years are at a disproportionately high risk for both fatal and non-fatal crashes, with the highest per capita and per-mile-driven crash rate of any age group. Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of teen deaths, accounting for 44% of teen fatalities in the U.S. If these crash fatalities continue without intervention, 100,000 adolescents and young adults will die in young driver crashes (drivers between the ages of 16 and 24 years) in the U.S. over the next 10 years.

It’s up to us to teach our teens that when you are operating a motor vehicle it’s time to put away the ways of children and take on the role of adults. See that you oversee the driving education of your children, teach by example, drive like you want your teens to drive. Practice safety, courtesy and good sense when you are behind the wheel, don’t text or talk on your cell phone. When you see a teen drivers acting the fool, call 911 or *847 for the Highway Patrol.

If you or a loved one is injured or killed in a Tennessee automobile accident involving a teen driver contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident attorney’s at Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of our free consultation to get an understanding of your rights and remedies.

The Federal Highway Administration recently announced it will conduct “the first major in-depth analysis of motorcycle safety in nearly three decades.” The study will be conducted by researchers at Oklahoma State University’s Oklahoma Transportation Center, which is one of the Department of Transportation’s 10 National University Transportation Centers. A provision in the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, EfficientTransportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users required the study, but its launch was delayed due to funding issues. Researchers plan to evaluate data from motorcycle crashes to help identify common factors, which FHWA officials said will be useful to find countermeasures. The last motorcycle causation study was completed in 1981 by NHTSA. In September, NHTSA concluded a pilot study on motorcycle crash causes and outcomes. DOT spokesperson Rae Tyson said completion of the pilot study was necessary to help OSU researchers establish research criteria for the upcoming study.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) per vehicle mile traveled in 2006, motorcyclists were about 35 times more likely than passenger car occupants to die in a motor vehicle traffic crash and 8 times more likely to be injured. Speeding, traveling too fast for conditions or in excess of the posted speed limit, is a factor in almost one-third of all fatal crashes and costs America approximately $27.7 billion dollars in economic losses each year. Speeding is a safety concern on all roads, regardless of their speed limits. Much of the public concern about speeding has been focused on high-speed Interstates. The Interstate System, however, actually has the best safety record of all roads and the lowest fatality rate of all road classes.

Motorcycle Safety Study

Collector roads usually have legal speed limits of 55 mi/h or less. Speed limits on local roads are often 35 mi/h or lower.

If you or a family member is injured in a Tennessee motorcycle accident you owe it to your self to contact the experienced Tennessee motorcycle accident attorney’s at Phillip Miller & Associates and take advantage of a free consultation to learn about your rights and remedies.

Booze It And Lose It

An underage drinking driver, high speed, and early morning hours make for a deadly cocktail that cost the life of an Antioch man and will bring criminal charges against his cousin, the driver of the vehicle. According to an article posted on the website of Nashville NewsChannel5 Miguel Crispin-Reyes, 19, was driving at a high rate of speed with his cousin Ancelmo Crispin-Herrera,21, riding in the front seat with him when he, for some unknown reason, left the road and rolled. Mr. Crispin-Herrera was trapped in the vehicle and was pronounced dead at the scene. Mr. Crispin-Reyes is listed in stable condition at Vanderbilt Medical Center.

Such a tragedy, how sad that one poor decision has changed the lives of two young men and their family forever. My sympathy and prayers go out to them.

As an experienced Nashville car accident lawyer I want to remind you that driving with a BAC of .08 or higher is illegal in every state. If you follow my blog you will see that in Tennessee we continue to see a tragic number of people with debilitating injuries and deaths as a result of impaired driving. This careless disregard for human life must stop

Drunk driving is one of America’s deadliest crimes. In Tennessee in 2008, 327 people were killed in crashes where the driver or motorcyclist had a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of .08 or higher. That is down from 377 people killed in 2007 with a BAC of .08 or higher. Over the 2008 Labor Day holiday, 12 people were killed in 10 fatal crashes on Tennessee roadways, down from 17 people killed on Tennessee roadways in 2007.

With the winter holidays approaching we must redouble out efforts and be vigilant in reminding our family and friends of the dangers and the high price, not just the driver, but his passengers and families pay as the result of an automobile accident. If you see a driver who appears to be drunk dial *847 and report them to the Tennessee State Troopers.

If you or a loved one is injured in a Nashville automobile accident contact the experienced Nashville automobile accident attorney’s at Phillip Miller & Associates for a free consultation so that you can learn about your rights and remedies.