Rogersville Tennessee Personal Injury Law Blog

Our readers in Tennessee who are familiar with previous posts here know that the danger of distracted driving is widespread throughout the state, and throughout the rest of the country as well. These days, most people seem to willingly put their own lives and the lives of others in danger simply so that they can send or read a text or email, or even look at the internet while driving. We have all seen these drivers on the roads by now, and we shake our heads at the reckless behavior.

However, some drivers may not realize that this type of distracted driving behavior can also lead to police action. A recent news article detailed a law enforcement operation in Tennessee that was aimed at pulling over distracted drivers for their reckless behavior. The event was called "Operation Incognito" and it was led by the Tennessee Highway Patrol.

Of all the legal terms that Tennessee residents will likely need to become familiar with in the course of preparing and pursuing a personal injury lawsuit, there is perhaps no more important term than "negligence." This is the key term in most personal injury cases, which needs to be proven to be successful in court. So, how can you prove negligence in a personal injury lawsuit?

Well, for starters, the most important step is to understand the elements of "negligence," which typically forms the basis of a personal injury claim. First, there must have been a duty owed between the parties involved in the lawsuit - one to another. Second, that duty must have been breached in some way. For instance, in a car accident, perhaps one driver was distracted by a cellphone - not paying attention to the task of driving. To engage in such conduct is to breach the duty that driver owes to all other drivers on the road, which is to operate the vehicle safely.

By now most people in America, including our readers in Tennessee, are well-aware of the danger that distracted drivers present to all others on the road. Public and private awareness campaigns have informed the public for years now about this danger but, unfortunately, distracted drivers are, perhaps, more common now than ever before. The primary reason: smartphones.

Statistics from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration show that in one recent year, 2016, almost 3,500 people in America died in accidents in which the primary cause was distracted driving. Distracted driving is so common that most people have engaged in it and may not have even been aware, with activities such as eating, talking to people in the vehicle, changing the radio station and even drinking a cup of coffee on the morning commute all being considered as activities that take a driver's attention off of the task of operating the vehicle.

There are a lot of winding roads in Tennessee's rural areas, but there are plenty of city streets as well. What do all of these roads have in common? Heavy-haul trucks use them to deliver goods throughout the state and the country as a whole. While most of the drivers of these "big rigs" are well-trained and are good at their jobs, there are, unfortunately, some who, either through negligence or recklessness, place the lives of other drivers at risk.

So, what are some of the common ways that truck drivers cause accidents, be it on highways in rural areas or the downtown area of a city? Well, for starters, truck drivers who have not received the appropriate level of training to handle these huge vehicles present a danger not only to others, but also to themselves. If these drivers don't know how to handle the vehicles, or at least they don't know how to handle them in certain situations, the potential to cause devastating truck accidents becomes very real.