Truck Accidents in Monroe County
Automobile accidents are a leading cause of injury and death across the United States. Of particular risk is heavy truck crashes, or those involving commercial trucks and trailers. Truck accidents tend to be more damaging than other types of collisions, due in large part to a truck’s excessive weight.
Truck accident attorneys from Foley Law Firm are especially interested in how truck accidents affect drivers in Pennsylvania. Here, we present truck accident data that should be of special interest to drivers in Scranton, PA, Stroudsburg, PA, and Wilkes-Barre, PA, with particular focus on truck accidents in Monroe County.
Statewide Truck Accident Statistics
Each year, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation releases accident data for the previous year. We have recently reviewed the 2019 Pennsylvania Crash Facts and Statistics report to see how automobile crashes, and truck accidents in particular, affected drivers across our state in 2019.
According to the report, Pennsylvania had a total of 125,267 reportable traffic crashes in 2019. Of these, 7,631 crashes involved heavy trucks. Statistically speaking, this isn’t an alarmingly high number. In fact, this data shows that heavy truck accidents account for under 6 percent of the total reportable crashes for the year. However, when we look at heavy truck accident fatalities, we see far different totals.
In 2019, there were 122 fatal heavy truck crashes across the state, resulting in 128 fatalities. This is 128 fatalities related to heavy truck accidents out of a total of 1,059 traffic-related fatalities for the year. This means that accidents involving heavy trucks were responsible for 12.3 percent of the fatal crashes in Pennsylvania in 2019, even though they made up just roughly 6 percent of total crashes.
Accident Data for Monroe County
As of 2019, Pennsylvania had a population of 12,801,989, spread out across 67 counties. Monroe County is not one of Pennsylvania’s largest. The population of Monroe County is 170, 271, meaning the county holds just 1.3 percent of the state’s population.
Although Monroe County is not especially large, automobile accidents are still a leading cause of injury and financial loss in the area. And accident fatalities are also a concern. The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation reports 2,393 automobile crashes in Monroe County in 2019. This means that crashes in Monroe County account for 1.9 percent of the state’s total annual crashes, which is slightly higher than its percentage of the population. Of the crashes in Monroe County, 16 were fatal and 994 resulted in injuries.
The annual crash report does not break down each county’s accident numbers by the types of vehicles involved. However, if the state’s accident data is representative of Monroe County’s accident data, a good portion of the county’s accidents may have involved heavy trucks, and were likely responsible for a notable percentage of the county’s accident injuries and fatalities.
Truck Accident Damages
Crash data presented by the Department of Transportation makes it clear that truck accidents should be a significant concern for drivers in Monroe County and across the state. Each truck accident that resulted in injuries or fatalities was likely also the cause of financial and emotional hardships. Potential truck accident damages include:
- Medical expenses
- Expense of ongoing treatment and/or therapy
- Pain and suffering
- Diminished quality of life
- Lost wages
- Loss of wage earning potential
- Loss of companionship, funeral and burial expenses, and loss of income/benefits (when truck accidents are fatal)
Obtain Compensation for Accident Damages
If you are one of the many people who has been injured in an automobile accident involving a heavy truck, you may be due financial compensation for your losses. To discuss your accident with the attorneys at Foley Law Firm, send us a message online, or call (570) 342-8194 and schedule a personal consultation.