Personal Injury Cases – Law Offices of Mark E. Salomone & Morelli

Throughout Hartford, New Britain, Norwich, Manchester, New Haven and surrounding areas, motorists need to be aware that the impending arrival of summer brings new driving challenges. A personal injury lawyer knows that countless serious and potentially fatal car accidents occur during the summer months. There are many factors that tend to make summer a dangerous time for motorists. 

Why is the Summer High Risk for Driving?

The Mirror summarized 10 of the big risk factors that drivers face during the summer months that increase the chances of motor vehicle accidents. These include:

• An increase in the number of bicycle riders on the roads. Drivers often do not know how to be safe around bike riders. Drivers need to ensure they leave plenty of space around bike lanes, especially when passing bicycle riders.
• An increase in motorcyclists on the roads. Warm weather means more bikers on motorcycles. Motorcycle accidents are most likely to cause serious injury or death to the motorcycle rider. However, a motorcycle that hits the side of a car and causes a 40 MPH change in speed has an 85 percent chance of causing death to someone in the passenger car.
• Rain after a dry spell. If there is no rain over a period of three weeks, the risk of a fatal crash is 10 percent higher when the rain arrives. The risk of a crash is lowest when it rains steadily, rather than when it rains rarely. This is because dust, diesel and oil can start to linger on a road without rain. When it finally does rain, those substances can take days to wash away- and the road will be slick in the meantime. The first rain in a while also comes as a surprise to drivers who may have grown used to dry conditions.
• An increase in teen motorists. There is a one in five chance a teen driver will become involved in a collision within the first six months of having a new license. More teens are driving during the break from school, so there’s thus more chance of these inexperienced motorist causing crashes.
• An increase in child pedestrians. Kids tend to be outside playing more often in the summer, so there’s a great chance of them getting hit by a car. Around 85 percent of pedestrian deaths involve motor vehicle accidents with drivers traveling between 30 and 40 miles an hour.
• An increase in vacationers. Tourists visiting an area often don’t know where they are going and are distracted by a GPS, map, or even sightseeing. This increases the chance these motorists will cause accidents.
• An increase in tractors. Farmers often move equipment during the summer, and tractors sometimes ends up on busy roads.
• An increase in vegetation. A greener world and faster growing plants means impaired visibility.
• More mobile deer. Deer tend to move around from their breeding locations during spring and the early months of summer.
• An increase in motor vehicle breakdowns. Drivers on the road during the heat, especially taking long road trips, have a greater chance of their car breaking down. This could be dangerous when the car is on the road.

These are just a few of many reasons why the summer is a time when you need to be especially careful to drive safely and watch out for hazards that could cause you to become involved in a collision.

Contact a Hartford accident attorney today at the Law Offices of Mark E. Salomone & Morelli. Call 1-800-WIN-WIN-1 for your free case consultation or visit http://www.salomoneandmorelli.com.  Also serving New Britain and Norwich to Manchester, New Haven and the Waterbury area. 

Throughout Hartford, New Britain, Norwich, Manchester, New Haven and surrounding areas, warm spring weather means that weather conditions are more likely to be foggy. Fog is one of the most dangerous weather conditions that drivers encounter on the road. 

A personal injury lawyer knows that the risk of an auto accident is as much as doubled when the fog rolls in. Drivers need to know how to be safe behind the wheel, even in these bad weather conditions. A careless or negligent driver who makes unsafe choices when it is foggy out could be held responsible for causing a motor vehicle crash that hurts or even kills other motorists.

How to Stay Safe When Driving in Fog

Smart Motorist warns that fog is statistically the most dangerous of all weather conditions. The best thing to do is to avoid driving until the fog has lifted. If, however, you are on the road and need to get through the fog, there are a few things that you can do to try to avoid becoming involved in an accident. Drivers who encounter fog should:

• Put on headlights, but not high beams. High beams can have an adverse impact on frontward visibility because of the reflection of the light on the fog. Although regular low light headlights can also make it a little harder to see in front of you sometimes, you still need to put them on when it is foggy out because otherwise oncoming motorist will not see your vehicle.
• Keep your eyes trained on the right line on the road. This is called the fog line and it helps you to stay on course in your lane. Do not focus on the center line, or you could end up moving into oncoming traffic inadvertently.
• Use fog lights, if you have them. Some European cars are equipped with rear-fog lights that can help to significantly increase the visibility of the vehicle and avoid a rear-end crash.
• Never stop on the road. If you stop on the road, other drivers are not going to be able to see you and there’s a very strong chance of a rear-end accident. If you decide you cannot continue driving in the fog, pull completely off onto the shoulder of the road in order to avoid getting hit.
• Slow down and stay focused on the speedometer. Driving at a slow pace for weather conditions is important to trying to reduce the dangers of fog. Some research suggests that drivers who become accustomed to the fog will begin to increase their speed when driving, sometimes without even realizing it. You need to keep an eye on how fast you are actually going.

Past research has suggested that a driver’s speed perceptions are affected by fog, prompting motorists to go too fast and increasing crash risks. A recent study published by the National Institutes of Health, however, suggests that the reality is that fog does affect speed perception but that motorists mostly tend to slow down as a result and not speed up. The discrepancy could come from the fact that past studies on fog adjusted overall contrast to simulate fog, which is more akin to driving with a foggy windshield rather than in actual real-world fog conditions.

Contact a Hartford accident attorney today at the Law Offices of Mark E. Salomone & Morelli. Call 1-800-WIN-WIN-1 for your free case consultation or visit http://www.salomoneandmorelli.com.  Also serving New Britain and Norwich to Manchester, New Haven and the Waterbury area.