Articles Posted in Motorcycle Accidents

The answer to the question posed in the title of this blog post is “yes”.  I will show you how this is true using a recent case I settled as an example.

My pedestrian-client was injured while j-walking across East Genesee Street in Auburn, right outside our main office. The pedestrian seemingly did everything wrong:  She chose to cross the street a hundred feet or so from an intersection equipped with a traffic light and crosswalk.  Further, she did so at night, dressed in dark clothing, so dark in fact that the witnesses who saw her lying on the pavement after the collision assumed she was a black trash bag that had blown into the road.  The only thing that “tipped off” the witnesses that the black bundle in the road was a person was a shock of blond hair.

Despite these seemingly “bad facts”, we got a substantial settlement for her. How?

At M&S, we are big on safety, and that includes motorcycle safety.  But safety requires some study and practice.  We like to say that “safe riding is no accident!”  We urge our biking clients to read up on and follow the strictest biking safety guidelines.  But unfortunately, there are many FALSE biking safety tips out there.  And some myths never die no matter how much evidence accumulates to debunk them.  For example, remember when they used to tell you that eating before you swim was a no-no because it could cause you to cramp up and drown?  Turned out to be false!  Still, many people still believe it to be true.

Here are the most common and enduring myths about motorcycle safety.  Share these with any friends or family members who bike:

MYTH 1. Full-Face Helmets Restrict Your Visibility

Hey Upstate New York bikers, it’s that time of year again.  You’ve probably taken your motorcycle out of storage, tuned it up, wiped it down, and taken a few rides. Good for you.  Now all you need  is to freshen up on safety.  You might think (cynically) that New York motorcycle accident lawyers like us would rather wait for you to have the accident and then turn a profit off of your suffering.  No!  Believe me, we have plenty of work, and we would rather save a life than add one more case to our portfolio.

Knowledge is power.  If you know how most Upstate New York motorcycle accidents happen, you are more likely to avoid them.  So are you curious to know the most common types of motorcycle accidents here in Upstate New York, including the Syracuse and Rochester areas?  Thought so.  Here they are:

Head-On Collision As Car Turns Left

I came across a New York Times article the other day with the above title.  I didn’t have to read the article to know it was true; having worked as a New York car accident lawyer for more that two decades, I have personally witnessed the effects of smartphones on driving accidents.

Some of the apps for smart phones out there seem almost designed to kill drivers (and those they collide with). Take for instance the “snapchat” app’s speed filter.   Want to impress your friends as you are driving along the highway?  Ratchet your speed up to 120 miles per hour and then snap a video of your view from the car. Now you can post the video on snapchat instantly.  Your friends will see the video with your speed — “120 mph” — superimposed on it.  They will think you are so cool!

Another dangerous app is Waze.  Full disclosure:  I love Waze. I use it every time I am driving in big urban areas like New York City or Philadelphia.  It works just like any other navigator but it actually finds you the quickest route to get where you are going based on the current traffic conditions, including construction slow-downs, roadway accidents blocking traffic, traffic jams, and even objects in the road blocking a lane of travel.  But how does Waze know about all these conditions?  Other Waze users observe these conditions as they drive by and then hit buttons on Waze’ app screen to notify Waze about them.  Those drivers might feel like good Samaritans by helping other Waze users steer clear of traffic obstructions, but they are risking their own and other lives by paying attention to their phone screen instead of the road.

Car accident fatalities are on the rise.  Why?  You probably know (especially if you regularly read this blog):  Smart phone texting and social media.  Drivers, especially young ones, are crashing as they gaze down at their phones.  Sure the texting driver is liable, but is anyone else?  What about the friend that was texting to the driver and who knew he was driving?  An appellate court last year in New Jersey said, yes, that guy can be liable, too.

But here’s a new twist:  What about Apple or other companies that make the phones that are distracting us?  What if I told you that Apple has a powerful technology that can detect when the person using the phone is driving a car, and that the same technology can block access to the phone when that is happening?  Shouldn’t Apple be liable for having failed to implement that technology?  After all, it is now well known that social media is an “addiction” and some of those who are glued to their screens can’t seem to help themselves from “sneaking a peek” even while driving in heavy traffic.

Can Apple, or any of the other smart phone producers, be held liable?  That’s what a new lawsuit in Texas will help decide.  The product liability lawsuit, filed against Apple by families of the victim of a car crash caused by a texting driver, contends that Apple (1) knew its phones would be used for texting while driving, (2) had gone so far as to design technology to block drivers’ phones from being operational, but (3) did not deploy the life-saving technology.