Big Rig Truck Head-On Collisions in Colorado Springs

Truck Head-On Collisions

Written by Jeremy D. Earle, JD

May 26, 2023

Head On Accident with Truck in Colorado Springs, Colorado

A car collision is terrible enough, but when a truck strikes you head-on, you should anticipate serious—if not catastrophic—injuries or death.

Colorado Springs is a large metropolis that stretches to Galveston and beyond, which means a lot of truck traffic provides goods to all the grocery shops, petrol stations, and other merchants that keep the populace afloat. Because of the increased truck traffic, residents and visitors to Colorado Springs are more likely to be involved in a truck accident.

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HEAD-ON COLLISIONS: WHAT CAUSES THEM?

A truck driver may abandon their lane and cross into yours for various causes, including a medical emergency such as a seizure, stroke, or heart attacks such as a seizure, stroke, or heart attack.

  • The truck driver is distracted by a mobile phone, radio, or another gadget, which causes a head-on accident.
  • Operating a motor car while under the influence of narcotics, alcohol, or other illegal substances.
  • Driving while under the influence of prescribed drugs that are legal.
  • The motorist is drowsy.
  • A truck’s auto component, such as the brakes or an airline, fails, causing the driver to lose control.
  • One of your tires blows out.
  • The road is littered with rubbish.
  • The truck swerves due to other cars, pedestrians, bicycles, or animals.
  • The driver is inexperienced or insufficiently trained for the job due to slick roadways.

These are just a few of the reasons why a truck could collide with you. Head-on truck collisions are more likely to result in long-term or permanent disability due to truck accident injuries due to the size and weight—even an empty truck.

INJURIES FROM A HEAD-ON TRUCK COLLISION

You could be fortunate and end up with bumps, bruises, scratches, and cuts, as well as a sprain or strain.

However, you’re more prone to get more severe injuries, such as 

  • Simple and complicated fractures.
  • Internal injuries and internal bleeding 
  • Spinal cord injuries 
  • Traumatic brain injuries 
  • Crushed bones 
  • Face and eye injuries 
  • Head, neck, and shoulder injuries and whiplash 
  • Internal injuries and internal bleeding
  • Muscle pulls and tears, as well as other soft tissue injuries
  • Burns caused by heat and/or chemicals

Secondary injuries, such as infections, are also a possibility. Suppose you have underlying diseases that weaken your immune system. In that case, open wounds are more likely to get infected, whether received in the accident or from surgery for accident injuries.

Diabetes, immunodeficiencies, and even drugs and therapies like chemotherapy may all impact how fast you heal and whether or not an open wound becomes infected.

Furthermore, accident injuries may aggravate an existing ailment, resulting in increased medical expenditures as well as pain and suffering. The court may hold the defendant accountable for such damages since you would not have made your prior injury or condition worse if it weren’t for the truck accident.

WHAT TO DO IF YOU HAVE A TRUCK-ON-TRUCK COLLISION

Call 911 and check on other drivers if you can move without inflicting more harm to yourself. Take pictures of the accident and tell the officer what happened. Allow the emergency medical personnel to examine you.

Obtain contact information from other drivers and witnesses, including passengers in other cars involved in the accident, if at all possible. You should also get the driver’s registration, insurance, and employment information, as well as the CDL licensing information.

Go to the hospital and get your health adequately examined. Remember that specific injury might show up hours or even days after an injury!

Do not move if you feel you can do so without inflicting further harm to yourself! Call 911 if you can get to your phone.

Even before your doctor releases you, you or a loved one should contact a truck accident lawyer as soon as possible. You have up to two years to launch a lawsuit in Colorado, but most insurance companies only offer you a few days to submit a claim—sometimes as little as 15 days.

INSURANCE COMPANIES TO DEAL WITH

You may phone an insurance company to report a car accident, but just provide:

  • Your name.
  • Contact information.
  • The date and location of the accident.
  • The contact information for your attorney.

Insurance firms will go to any length to avoid paying out a claim; they have no compassion for you and simply want to keep their profit margins as high as possible.

Attorneys are familiar with the techniques used by insurance companies, such as distorting your words to place responsibility on you rather than the at-fault motorist. Because insurance companies are aware of this, they are less likely to deceive an attorney.

Outright rejecting a claim without providing you a reason is one of the acts and inactions the insurance company may do to save money.

Failing to communicate immediately about your claim, perhaps leading you to miss deadlines.

Undervaluing a claim, mainly if the injuries are likely to result in long-term or permanent impairments.

Procrastinating and delaying the resolution of your claim.

Conducting a preliminary or non-investigative investigation of your claim.

Insurance companies know that you’re more likely to take your case to court if you hire an attorney if they don’t make a fair and reasonable offer. As a result, having an attorney increases your chances of receiving the money you deserve. Demonstrate that you’re serious about your work!

DAMAGES RECOVERIES

In Colorado car accidents, you may claim three sorts of damages.

Compensatory damages include both economic and non-economic losses. These are ordered by the court to make you whole again. While the money will not alleviate your anguish or bring a loved one back, it will help lessen the financial strain caused by your incapacity to work after the accident.

Punitive damages are only awarded as a form of punishment to the defendant. If the court determines that you are not entitled to compensatory damages, you cannot seek punitive damages. As a result, if you seek punitive damages, the trial is split in two (meaning it is in two parts.)

The court hears the evidence first, and the jury awards you the compensatory damages you deserve. The jury decides whether the defendant should pay compensatory damages and renders the judgment in the second portion, generally with the same judge and jury.

Economic Losses

Special damages, often known as economic damages, have a monetary value and include the following:

Expenses for medical treatment

You might get reimbursed for both past and future medical expenditures. Medical expenditures incurred before a settlement or trial award are incurred due to the accident. Future medical expenses are those that you will incur as a result of the accident but after you have received a settlement or a trial award.

Medical costs are included in medical expenses include surgical charges, follow-up visits, regular doctor’s appointments, ambulatory aids, medicines, and therapy fees, such as physical therapy, occupational therapy, and cognitive and other psychological treatments.

Suppose you need to construct wheelchair ramps, grab bars, or otherwise modify your house to accommodate your injuries and disability due to the accident. In that case, the defendant is responsible for those costs and installing hand controls or making other car modifications.

Wages that have been lost

You may be able to recover past and future lost income if your accident injuries prohibit you from working. Past lost earnings comprise the period you were unable to work from the date of the damage until you reached a settlement or won a trial award.

Suppose your physicians feel your injuries produced long-term or permanent disability that prohibits you from working. In that case, you may be entitled to future lost income due to a settlement or trial judgment.

You might be able to collect a portion of your future lost income if your truck accident injuries resulted in a long-term or permanent disability that prohibits you from working at the hourly rate or pay you had before the accident.

Personal belongings

Suppose you were on a motorcycle, bicycle, or walking when the truck hit you. In that case, you may be able to recover compensation from replacing or repairing your personal property, including your car, anything of value in the car, or anything you were carrying with you if you were on a motorcycle, bicycle, or walking when the truck hit you.

Computers, mobile phones, clothes, and other objects in your possession may fall into this category.

Expenses associated with the end of life. Finally, if the head-on accident was deadly, you may be able to recover expenditures for a loved one’s funeral, burial, and/or cremation.

Non-Economic Damages

General damages, also known as non-economic losses, have no monetary value since it is challenging to value things like loss of use or pain and suffering.

  • Pain and suffering, especially emotional anguish, are examples of non-economic damages.
  • A reduction in quality of life if you must use ambulatory aids or take prescription medicine for the remainder of your life.
  • A lack of companionship if you cannot participate in family activities and events.
  • Loss of consortium if you and your spouse can no longer have a physical connection.
  • The inability to utilize a bodily part such as your hand or foot.
  • Loss of a biological function, such as vision or bladder control.
  • Inconvenience if you have to pay someone to perform your regular duties, such as housecleaning, lawn care, food shopping, and home maintenance and repair.
  • Amputation of a limb or a finger.
  • Disfigurement and/or scarring that is extreme.

You may need psychiatric treatment as a result of your emotional suffering. This is typical in severe accidents and is not anything to be embarrassed by. The injuries may not be painful in certain situations, but the overwhelming emotions of the accident might lead to anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder.

For example, if a truck collides with you, the damage is minimal since the driver was driving slowly. Your mind, on the other hand, could only think of your wailing kid and how he or she was hurt.

Even if you turn around and see your kid with a few bruises and scratches, your mind has already conjured up images of more severe injuries. For others, this is upsetting, and they may need psychiatric help to cope with the anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms that occur.

IN THE EVENT OF A TRUCK ACCIDENT, WHO IS LIABLE FOR MY LOSSES?

Commercial car accidents vary from other types of accidents in that you may be able to collect damages from many sources.

In certain circumstances, the driver is not entirely to blame for the collision. Other entities—and people—you may want to involve in a settlement or jury trial are:

  • The trucking business 
  • An independent owner/operator 
  • The lessee and/or lessor 
  • A third-party repair technician 
  • A third-party inspector 
  • A third-party dispatcher 

If the accident was caused by poorly maintained roadways, the city, county, or state

Another driver, such as one who cuts a truck off and causes it to lose control (In some cases, more than one other driver could share in the responsibility for causing the accident.)

Parts manufacturers (for example, faulty parts with concealed faults) 

Truck and/or trailer manufacturers The problem was not visible to the repair technician or the business that supplied the components. You may be able to sue the firm that made the faulty item if it was the cause of the accident.)

If the motorist does not have enough insurance to pay your losses, you may have to sue them personally in certain car accident instances. In a commercial car accident, however, if more than one person is at fault, you have a better chance of recovering the compensation you deserve from the various insurance companies because liability is spread across multiple parties and not just one insurance company is responsible for the entire cost of the damages.

The Cost of a Truck-on-Truck Collision

When you hire a personal injury lawyer, they will undoubtedly provide you with a free first case examination. If you decide to hire an attorney, you will almost certainly be asked to sign a contingency agreement, which means you will not be charged for their services until they win your case.

The contract spells out all of the fees and expenditures, as well as when you’ll have to pay them, including things like depositions, investigations, and expert witness fees. Some of these costs may be avoided if you settle your case—it all relies on the insurance company’s actions.

If you or a loved one has been wounded or killed in a head-on truck crash, you deserve an advocate to help you get through this difficult time. Contact a compassionate Colorado Springs truck accident attorney now and learn more about the compensation you are entitled to.

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