Personal Injury Law

Warning for Georgia Drivers: Watch Out for Texting Truckers!

For those of you who have followed my blog, you know that one of my greatest concerns is the danger that texting drivers present to the motoring Georgia public. Texting while driving is not illegal in Georgia...yet. It is already illegal in several states. Today, another extremely alarming study was made public that concludes truckdrivers who text while driving their semi-trucks are 23 times more likely to cause an accident than another undistracted driver who is driving a passenger vehicle. 23 times! Watch out, Friends!

I have been pointing out incident after incident where an operator of some type of vehicle caused an accident because he or she was admittedly texting while driving. This is especially scary when the offending "texter" s the operator of a public transit vehicle, e.g., a bus or a train. For example, in Boston, Massachusetts, a trolly operator has just been indicted on charges of gross negligence for causing a collision with another trolley that injured 62 people, all caused by his texting when he was supposed to be driving the trolley. In September of last year, a commuter train engineer missed a stop signal while trading text messages with a friend, leading to a collision with a freight train that killed 25 people in California, according to federal investigators. The accident injured 101 people.

What will it take here in Georgia for Georgia Legislators to act? How much scientific evidence do they need to know that texting while driving has become an extremely dangerous proposition for the motoring Georgia public who are doing their best to drive cautiously on Georgia roads? Until texting drivers face some harsh consequences, all I can advise is to stay away from truckers. I would suggest you do this anyway, but with the new study showing that texting truckdrivers are an accident to waiting to happen on Georgia roads, just stay away from them on the road.

Full post as published by Atlanta Injury Lawyer Blog on July 28, 2009 (boomark / email).