Tires Fly Off Truck Causing a Crash

I’m David Holub, an attorney focusing on personal injury law in northwest Indiana.

Welcome to Personal Injury Primer, where we break down the law into simple terms, provide legal tips, and discuss personal injury law topics.

Today’s question comes from a caller who said he was driving along the highway when two tires broke off a semi-tractor trailer truck ahead of him on the road. He said the pieces of tires flew off, smashing his windshield and causing him to lose control briefly after hitting him and injuring his shoulder, and wrenching his back. The semi kept traveling and did not stop. He was calling about his legal options.

Unfortunately, situations like that described by the caller are frequent.

Perhaps it’s the less-than-perfect economy that we live in. Still, trucking operators are cutting corners much more than in the past.

There are, of course, trucking industry regulations that require a vehicle’s tires to be inspected each day before the driver climbs into the cab and pulls out onto the highway. Brakes are also to be checked daily, and the lights on the vehicle are to be examined.

The caller’s situation depends on whether the semi-tractor trailer can be identified and, if not, whether the caller has insurance to protect him in such as situation.

Though the truck left the scene, an effort should be made to identify the truck. If not, there may be no way to sue the trucking company that put that truck on the highway.

Frequently callers will be able to get a license plate, and the license plate will allow identification of the vehicle. Once the vehicle is identified, you can pin down a particular vehicle’s location on the highway by checking GPS records.

The caller took pictures of the tires and the damage to the vehicle to establish what happened. He could not get a license plate, but he verified that it was a truck displaying a logo for a well-known trucking company.

If you don’t have a full license plate, all is not lost. Suppose you have solid proof that it’s a truck by an identifiable company. In that case, you could sue the suspect company and ask it to verify whether any of its trucks were in the vicinity of the crash at the date and time it happened. Secondarily the question would be to the trucking company, did any of your truckers report a loss of tires on that particular day for that specific location?

But suppose the vehicle that drove away cannot be identified. In that case, whether the caller has uninsured motorist insurance becomes critical.

Uninsured motorist insurance protects you if the driver responsible for hitting you has no insurance. In this case, the fault for the collision and injuries would rest with the semi-operator who threw off tires.

As we’ve noted in another podcast, some insurance policies providing uninsured motorist coverage require an impact between your vehicle and the vehicle that left the scene. In the caller’s circumstance, the tires would constitute the impact. So he would pass that hurdle.

In situations like the caller described there may be more avenues of investigation. Do not hesitate to hire an attorney in such a case.

I hope you found this information helpful. If you are a victim of someone’s carelessness, substandard medical care, product defect, work injury, or another personal injury, please call (219) 736-9700 with yo