Jacksonville Personal Injury Blog

St. Augustine police are looking into a crash that occurred early Sunday, September 26, around 2:30 a.m. Channel 4 reports that an SUV was traveling westbound on State Road 206,when the driver lost control and the vehicle crashed into the woods, ejecting two people out of the SUV near U.S. 1. The two vehicle occupants have not been identified but both were taken to Shands Medical Center in Jacksonville. Both are reported to be in critical condition.

Seat Belt Use
Although it is unclear from this report, generally speaking, when someone is thrown from a vehicle, it is because they were not wearing their seat belt. Florida’s new seat belt law went into effect June 8, 2009, making it mandatory for all motorists to buckle up. It was named after Dori Slosberg and Katie Marchetti, two young women who were killed in separate traffic accidents when they were not wearing seat belts.

Florida joined 28 other states that require seat belt use making it a primary law.
Federal estimates were that the seat belt law should save about 125 lives a year and prevent more than 1,700 serious injuries.

Our condolences go out to the family members of the people injured in this crash. Florida auto accident injury attorneys would like to remind all motorists to buckle up when driving on Florida’s roads.

Actress Sally Field says she takes Boniva. Older post-menopausal women skip through a field, happy with life because they take Reclast. These drugs are all popular pharmaceuticals from the class known as bisphosphonates that are supposed to minimize the effects of the bone-thinning condition of osteoporosis.

Actonel, Zometa, Aclasta, and Fosamax are also in that group. But an international task force now says labeling on bisphoshonates should carry information about the risk of a rare thigh bone fracture if the drug is used over time, according to Consumer Affairs.

The group was convened by the American Society of Bone and Mineral Research and their study was published in the Journal of Bone and Mineral Research.

Looking at more than 300 cases of "atypical femur fractures," the evidence was overwhelming - 94 percent (291) of the patients had taken bisphosponates for five years or more. This is compelling because the condition is very rare so to find a link is suspicious.

The task force is urging better tracking of patients taking bisphosphonates for an extended amount of time and for more research.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has the option to require additional warning labels on the drug class but at this time the agency believes the benefits outweigh the risks.

Problems with Fosamax have brought about 1,000 lawsuits to Merck & Co. over the debilitating condition of osteonecrosis, or death of the jawbone. In June of this year, Merck lost to Shirley Boles who was awarded $8 million.

Millions of people, most of which are women, have taken these drugs since they were approved in 1995 and the jury is still out as the injuries come in.

Consumers who have taken these types of medications or who have been injured due to another defective drug have the option to contact an experienced Florida pharmaceutical litigation attorney with any questions.

Since its introduction in 2003, hundreds of serious injuries and related deaths have been blamed on the Yamaha Rhino recreational off-highway vehicle or ROV. Described as a golf cart on steroids, consumers have found the vehicles unstable even at very low speeds with a tendency to rollover, despite the splash it first made when the Yamaha Rhino was introduced into the market.

Yamaha is facing hundreds of lawsuits by victims who say the basic design flaw of the vehicle has led to rollover accidents, limb loss, and death when riders fell under the force of the 1,100 pound machine. Even a vice president of Yamaha was injured when he took one out for a test ride.

Fair Warning reports that so far Yamaha has been victorious in four the five cases that have gone to court. However in May, Yamaha lost a case in Georgia. And there are a reported 700 wrongful death and injury claims in the pipeline. This does not take into account at least 40 cases that have been quietly settled.

Also not in Yamaha’s favor is the fact that the company did not add doors until the 2008 model year. Without doors, the top-heavy vehicle with high clearance and a narrow base has rolled with riders extending their legs and arms to brace themselves in the fall.

Yamaha says the Rhino is safe and well-designed, and that injuries invariably resulted from risky operators. “Virtually every Rhino-related incident involves at least one warned against behavior (such as failure to wear a seatbelt and/or helmet, underage driver, excessive speed, alcohol/drugs or inattention to terrain/collision).”

That’s what Yamaha says. We’ll soon see if juries in three venues, Orange County, California, Gwinnett County, Georgia, and the Western District of Kentucky agree.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced the potential risks posed by surgical mesh systems in 2008. Since then, over 1,000 reports of complications were reported to the FDA within the last three years from nine surgical mesh manufacturers. Their reports related to problems created by surgical mesh devices associated with transvaginal placement used to help alleviate the symptoms of Pelvic Organ Prolapse (POP) and Stress Urinary Incontinence (SUI).

Some of the most common adverse affects of the surgical mesh systems, including the Bard Avaulta Mesh, include erosion through vaginal epithelium, pain, infection, urinary problems, and the return of prolapse and/or incontinence. In some instances, woman suffered bowel, bladder, and blood vessel perforation during insertion of the mesh. And if these conditions are not serious enough, other woman endured vaginal scarring and mesh erosion, which led to a considerable decrease in women’s quality of life caused by severe pain and discomfort, including painful sexual intercourse (dyspareunia).

Considering the severity of these complications, many women have needed to undergo additional surgical procedures (some of which were initiated to remove the mesh), hematoma or abscess draining, blood transfusions, and IV therapy.

Manufacturers of medical devices, including surgical mesh systems, are responsible for designing and creating products that are safe and will not pose any risk of injury or recurrence in patients. The types of adverse reactions associated with these mesh systems can present several emotional, financial, and physical challenges. Experienced Jacksonville Bard Avaulta surgical mesh injury attorneys can help women who have suffered serious complications as a result of a surgical mesh system.

It’s very sad when young teens have to say goodbye to one of their own after a car crash. That’s what happened in Satellite Beach, Florida where friends of Darren Devoe, 16, remembered him Tuesday morning, September 14, in a memorial service, an article on FloridaToday.com stated.

Devoe died Sunday, September 12, when he was a passenger in a car driven by his friend Jason Duprey. It was Duprey’s 17th birthday the morning of the crash. The 1993 Toyota was northbound on State Road A1A about 6:40 a.m. Sunday, September 12, when it hit a concrete utility pole. Duprey went to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries. The teens marked the utility pole with flowers and held their memorial service at the site.

Our condolences go out to all of the friends and family of this young man who certainly left this world too soon. Devoe’s 17th birthday was Thursday, September 16. Friends say he always had a smile on his face.

Teen Drivers
Florida has a graduated drivers license rules that delay obtaining a license until the age of 16. The Safe Teen and Novice Driver Uniform Protection, (STAND UP Act), proposes raising the age of obtaining a learners permit to 16 and delaying an unrestricted driver’s license until the teen turns at least 18.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety says that raising the age to obtain a permit would reduce fatalities among 15 to 17 year olds by about 13%. When tougher restrictions were imposed in Massachusetts, the fatality rate dropped 75% and injuries fell 38% according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

IIHS finds that half of parents surveyed support raising the minimum learners permit age.

Florida fatal car crash attorneys would once again like to extend our deepest condolences to the family and friends of this teen.

Similac powdered infant formula is being recalled after some consumers found beetles in the powder infant formula. The FDA Similac recall announcement states that Abbott Laboratories is voluntarily conducting the recall of millions of containers of powder Similac formula.

The company searched the Sturgis, Michigan plant further and found that some formula may contain parts of a small common beetle or its larvae. The products affected include Similac powder in the 8 ounce, 12.4 ounce, and 12.9 ounce cans.

Reuters reports the loss represents about $100 million to Abbott. Competitor, Mead Johnson’s Enfamil is seeing sales rise.

The problems for the company began when two consumers reported they found bugs in the powder. Abbott says it had made a decision to recall the product even before it received the beetle reports and that fewer than five million containers are affected. Similac infant formula powder has been distributed in the U.S., Puerto Rico, the Caribbean and Guam. The recall affects the powdered infant formula and not the liquid version. The product was all made on the same assembly line in Michigan.

Abbott says rest assured, when it tested the product it found 99.8% did not contain any beetle, which is an odd way to reassure consumers.

There were no injuries or illnesses reported to infants from the bugs.

The World Health Organization recommends that infants be breast fed exclusively for the first six months of life. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) about half of women end up breast feeding their infants that long, although about 70 to 90 percent initiate breastfeeding initially before rejecting the idea.

Jacksonville product liability attorneys and lawyers throughout the nation will continue to monitor the recall for any new developments.

A young Jacksonville woman was killed early Sunday morning, September 12, after her pickup truck left the highway and slammed into a tree. The 25-year-old is identified as Guadalupe Santos. She was driving on Interstate 295 north of Commonwealth Avenue around 9 a.m. As Santos headed south, she approached a vehicle in front of her who reports she was traveling at a high rate of speed. Before he could change lanes to the inside, Santos veered to the right shoulder where she lost control of her Ford pickup truck and struck the tree. The Florida Highway Patrol who responded, pronounced Santos dead at the scene. FHP reports she was not wearing a seat belt.

Our condolences go out to the family and friends of Santos, who reportedly leaves behind a seven-year-old daughter. Readers adding comments to News4Jax say Santos worked as a 911 dispatcher and she had plans to go to the police academy.

Seat Belts and Defective Autos
While law enforcement reports that Santos was not wearing a seat belt, it is also possible that her seat belt was defective and failed her when she needed it most.

We sometimes see that seat belts are produced with a manufacturing defect that may be the result of shoddy workmanship or poor quality materials. In the case of seat belts, that can cause them to fray, or unlatch and fail the motorist.

A manufacturing defect in a motor vehicle means the auto accident results in much worse injuries than would have occurred if the occupant had been strapped in properly. It might mean the difference between life and death.

If a manufacturing defect exists or shoddy workmanship or poor quality materials were used, and they pose a danger to consumers, the users can hold the manufacturer, seller, and/or distributor responsible in a court of law. The experienced Jacksonville auto product liability attorneys at Farah and Farah have been helping consumers injured by shoddy products for 30 years.

Florida is one of the worst states in the nation with regulations that consistently fail to protect young children in motor vehicle accidents, reports the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).

While the federal government, through the NTSB, recommends children up to the age of eight use specially designed child car seats or booster seats, Florida only requires child safety seats up to the age of three.

The NTSB says “laws in Arizona, South Dakota, American Samoa, and Puerto Rico are only slightly more protective, covering children age 4 years or younger. Twelve states (Alabama, Arkansas, California, Georgia, Iowa, Louisiana, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, and South Carolina) mandate child restraints for children age 5 or younger and six states (Connecticut, Idaho, Kentucky, Mississippi, New Mexico, and North Dakota) only cover children age 6 or younger.”

The NTSB names Florida specifically as having the “most lenient child passenger safety law in the nation” reports First Coast News.

The NTSB is calling on Florida and 20 other states plus American Samoa and Puerto Rico to have laws that require safety seats be used for children up to the age of six. Booster seat laws are needed in Arizona, Florida and South Dakota, according to an NTSB news release.

The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles does require children up to the age of four or five be secured by a child safety seat or a seat belt. But seat belts, engineered for adults, are notoriously unsafe if not fitted properly on the smaller body of a child. That’s where the booster seat comes in, so that adult seat belts restrain the child in his lap and shoulder at the proper position for maximum safety in a Florida car crash.

A California construction worker has sued Johnson & Johnson over a defective implanted hip- replacement that the maker kept selling even after adverse reports started surfacing. The unit of Johnson & Johnson named in the complaint is DePuy Orthopaedics. Plaintiff, Maurice Brigham, says that DePuy knew that 93,000 patients had experienced problems with their hip implants and had to undergo a second corrective surgery due to a product defect. Brigham had to undergo two implants in 2007 alone, reports Bloomberg.

The name of the medical device is ASR Hip Implant Device and it was recalled August 26, 2010. Brigham’s attorney says the company knew for two years that the product was failing, yet sold the defective device anyway. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has warned DePuy against selling two other brands of hip replacement devices for unapproved uses.
The medical device game is very lucrative. DePuy made more than $5.4 billion in sales last year. Expect this to be the beginning of thousands of product liability cases.

In a Florida product liability claim, it must be proven that there is something wrong with a product, in this case a medical device. The medical device could have a faulty design or it could have been manufactured poorly enough to cause injury. In both of these instances, J & J and DePuy could be accused with a failure to warn.

If you or someone you care about has seen your life changed because of a defective hip replacement product, the experienced Florida hip replacement recall injury attorneys at Farah and Farah can help you pursue compensation. Contact us today for more information about your legal rights and options.

The change was prompted by an airline crash that left no survivors near Buffalo last year. It turns out the pilot was tired as was the co-pilot, even before they started their flight from Newark, New Jersey.

Under the proposed overhaul of fatigue rules, an airline pilot will be able to get nine hours of rest between their work shifts. That represents a 13 percent increase from the current rules. This is the first proposed change of fatigue rules for airlines pilots in 15 years, reports Bloomberg.

The proposal would also require pilots to take more time off, at least 30 consecutive work-free hours every week, which represents a 25% increase from the current rules.

Generally pilots are in favor of the longer rest hours. After disembarking, traveling to a hotel and standing in lines, pilots may only have a few hours sleep.

With 700 million airline passengers every year, the rule reportedly will cost $804 million, phased in over 10 years and is facing a congressional deadline of August 2011.

Pilots are known to fly through several time zones on one trip. The current rules do not take into consideration sleep cycles. Also of concern is the fact that under the new rules pilots could in some circumstances work as long as 13 hours.

It took the death of 50 passengers in the Continental Airlines regional carrier crash near Buffalo, February 12, 2009, to underscore the hazards of fatigued plots. In that case, the pilot had come in from Florida and had spent two of three nights in pilot lounges without beds. The first officer had flown in from Washington State and was sick. Both were exhausted and discussed how they felt, even as the plant began nose-diving in a winter storm.

“Chronic sleep loss” contributed to the pilot’s failure to know how to handle the plane, said a federal investigation. Four months after this tragic crash, the Federal Aviation Administration began overhauling the pilot rest rules. Florida plane crash attorneys and people throughout the United States hope that the new rules will help ensure that pilots get the rest that they need in order to operate aircrafts safely and efficiently.

There may be fewer people dying on our nation’s highways in auto accidents but federal statistics do not show an improving picture in the number of child drownings this summer. The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) and the Home Safety Council (HSC) are releasing the statistics from the 2010 summer swimming season.

Next to California, Florida had the second highest number of child drowning in swimming pools this summer at 14. There were also 19 injuries.

California topped the nation with 27 drownings and 15 injuries.

In an average year, there are more than 200 children under the age of 1 who drown in spas or pools between Memorial Day and Labor Day. This year there were 172 drownings in that time period. In addition, there were more than 180 non-fatal incidents in pools and spas. The CPSC and HSC rely on media reports to base their findings.

The remaining top five states for drownings are Arizona (9 drownings), Texas (12 drownings) and Ohio (10 drownings).

What can parents do?

The two groups are asking there to be more vigilance by both parents and property owners who have pools and spas. A family with an in-ground pool needs to keep the attractive nuisance supervised. Adults need to be mindful of supervision and keeping children out of the area with an enclosed fence and self-latching gate.

Pools can be equipped with anti-entrapment safety drain covers as well as pool alarms on doors that lead from the home. Some pools are actually covered with a heavy-duty material to keep youngsters out.

The CPSC suggests having rescue equipment next to the pool as well as a cordless phone. The pool owner should know CPR. Children need to know how to swim. Learn more in this video provided by the CPSC at www.PoolSafely.gov.

An unidentified woman has been hospitalized with life-threatening injuries after being thrown from her pickup truck which landed on top of her. It happened Saturday, September 4, on County Road 16A about two miles east of C.R. 210. The woman was found on the side of the road under a 1986 Chevy pickup. The truck was overturned in a ditch. The woman was reportedly not wearing her seat belt. St. Johns Sheriff’s deputies had her airlifted to Shands Jacksonville Medical Center where she remains hospitalized.

Our sincere condolences go out to this woman and her family along with wishes for a speedy recovery from her injuries.

Seat Belt Safety
Traumatic head injury often results when a vehicle occupant is thrown from the car or truck. The assumption by readers of News4Jax is that the driver was not wearing her seat belt, but we do not know that to be true. In some rare cases, the seat belt can experience a design or manufacture failure, allowing the vehicle occupant to be ejected.

If I were a family member, I would want a St. Augustine personal injury attorney to examine all aspects of this vehicle to see if there was any product failure. The seat belt may have frayed or broken. The belt could have come loose from the bolts which anchor it to the floor. In some rare cases, the seat belt latch can come unbuckled, something known as false latching.

Older seat belt designs have a release button on the side that could inadvertently release in an Florida auto accident. An older seat belt likely is missing a shoulder belt to keep the person in the driver’s seat, and certainly did not have an airbag to keep the driver safe.

What appears to be a simple auto accident could actually be a defective product case but a careful examination of the vehicle is needed immediately while the evidence still exists.

A Virginia man is in critical condition with life-threatening injuries after he fell off a golf cart in Vilano Beach on Saturday evening, September 4, according to News4Jax.com. Christopher Chaplin, 31, was riding in the back of the golf cart. The driver was Murell Donald, 48, of Vilano Beach. The two were at the intersection of Myrtle and 14th Street when, for an unknown reason, Chaplin fell off the back and hit his head on the pavement.

He was taken to Shands Jacksonville with critical head injuries, according to the St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office.

While the cause of the crash is reported to be under investigation, we wish the best for a full and complete recovery of Mr. Chaplin.

Golf Cart Hazards
The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) reports there are 15,000 golf cart-related injuries that require emergency room treatment in the U.S. every year. A passenger ejection is one of the most common types of injury, and a head injury is the most common area to suffer from the fall. Children are particularly vulnerable to this type of accident. According to the CPSC, about 40% of accidents involving a golf cart involve someone falling out of the small electric vehicle, and about half involve children under the age of 16.

Another less common golf cart accident involves rollover accidents. About 10% of accidents in golf carts result in rollovers.

Adding to the seriousness of these accidents is the fact that most golf carts are not equipped with seat belts. The CPSC points out that the side handhold does nothing more than provide a fulcrum about which the ejected passenger will rotate. There are few side restraints to keep someone inside these dangerous vehicles.

If you or a loved one has been involved in a golf cart accident, the Jacksonville personal injury attorneys at Farah & Farah will be there for you to discuss the particulars of your case. In many instances, there is an at-fault party who can be held responsible to cover the costs of your personal and property injury. Call us.

The Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville has decided full disclosure is the best policy and is sending letters to 3,209 patients warning they may have been exposed to hepatitis C in the hospital, according to First Coast News.

A former employee at St. Luke’s Hospital and Mayo, radiologic technologist, Steven Beumel, 47, has been arrested and charged with stealing drugs from the hospital. Beumel admitted to police he is addicted to the narcotic, fentanyl, and injected himself with a dosage intended for patients. In doing so, he replaced the needle and filled the syringe with saline. A minute amount of blood remaining on the syringe is all that would be needed to transmit hepatitis C.

He reportedly did not know he had hepatitis C and the hospital and public health officials have traced three of the five cases to Beumel. In the other two cases, it is unclear how the patients contracted the disease. One patient has died.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the state health department was aware of the high numbers three years ago but was unable to pinpoint the source until recently.

Patients who receive the letter from Mayo will be tested for hepatitis C, which is an incurable liver disease.

Medical Errors
The 3,209 patients inside this “circle of risk” are an example of healthcare acquired infections, which are entirely preventable.

A 1999 Institute of Medicine report found that medical mistakes kill anywhere from 44,000-98,000 hospitalized Americans a year. Adverse drug events cause between 380,000 to 800,000 reactions per year. If all medical errors in Florida and throughout the nation as well as infections were tracked by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), this number would top the list of accidental deaths, including car accidents, poisoning, firearms deaths, and falls.

If you or a loved one has been the victim of a medical error, an experienced Florida medical malpractice attorney will offer a complimentary consultation on your situation.

The future livelihoods of those who work around the Gulf of Mexico depend on the condition of the Gulf waters following the worst oil spill in U.S. history. While the government heralds that the waters have miraculously cleared themselves of the crude oil, a new report by five marine scientists concludes almost 80 percent of the oil from the Deepwater Horizon disaster remains in the Gulf ecosystem. If true, that means fishermen cannot safely return to work and businesses associated with the Gulf waters cannot safely reopen.

The government said in an August 4 report, that only one-quarter of the oil remained because the rest had evaporated, been skimmed, burned, or recovered.

The group of scientists studied data from the same National Incident Command Report, used by the government to paint the rosy picture. But these scientists found that it would be impossible for that much oil to have dissolved or evaporated because only the crude oil on the surface of the Gulf would evaporate. Large plumes of crude oil are still trapped below the water.

One marine scientist from the University of Georgia, Charles Hopkinson, says “The oil is still out there, and it will likely take years to completely degrade. We are still far from a complete understanding of what its impacts are.”

One positive note - the oil has not been caught in the Loop Current therefore is unlikely to bring oil from the Gulf to the Atlantic and up the East Coast.

If you or a loved one has suffered a loss of property and income due to the Deepwater Horizon oil explosion and spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the Jacksonville oil spill economic loss attorneys at Farah & Farah will be happy to consult on your case and explore the many options for recovery.

A report just issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) finds that motor vehicle accidents cost every licensed driver in the U.S. about $500 a year. Car crashes cost about $99 billion annually in medical care and lost productivity.

Of the total, $3.6 billion goes toward treating children who are injured in car crashes, according to the report, published in the journal Traffic Injury Prevention.

In looking at car crash statistics from 2005, the CDC report finds that every ten seconds someone is treated in an ER for injuries suffered in an auto accident. Nearly 40,000 lives are lost every year as a result of car crashes.

The costs break down like this:

• Occupants of cars and light trucks: $70 billion
• Motorcyclists: $12 billion
• Bicyclists: $5 billion
• Pedestrians: $10 billion

Jacksonville is one of the top cities for pedestrian and bicycle accidents, many of which are severe, and make up about 6 percent of all injuries and fatalities. Motorcycles make up 12 percent of all of the injuries and related expense. Young people make up 28 percent of all of the fatalities and non fatal motor vehicle injuries as well as almost one-third of the cost ($31 billion), even though they represent just 14 percent of the population.

What is cutting down on the number of accidents?

• The Graduated Driver Licensing (GDL) policies which phase in driving privileges as the teen gets older and more responsible behind the wheel. The GDL is thought to have reduced crashes among 16-year-olds by 40 percent.
• Florida’s primary seat belt law now allows law enforcement to cite motorists for not wearing seat belts.
• Child safety seat distribution and education programs have ensured seats are correctly installed.

As if the morning rush hour isn’t bad enough, commuters had to dodge a twin-engine aircraft as it made an emergency landing along Interstate 10 on Tuesday, August 31, around 8:15 a.m. Traffic snarled for hours after commuters dodged the plane on the crowded highway, according to an article on News4Jax.com. The pilot and his passenger walked away from the crash landing while a small amount of fuel leaked from the plane.

The problem with the 1957 Aero Commander plane began earlier that morning after it took off from Herlong. Soon afterward, the pilot reported losing one engine. He tried to return to the airport when the other engine went out. At that point, pilot William Montgomery, 47, of Jacksonville, was forced into an emergency landing on the westbound lanes of I-10 at mile marker 353, which is near the large Publix warehouse.

Upon landing the plane’s right wing hit several trees and sheared off. Neither the pilot nor passenger, 27-year-old Kacper Gradzki of Orange Park, was injured.

The plane was on its way to Craig Airport for radio maintenance when it went down. The National Transportation Safety Board is sending inspectors to Jacksonville to determine what went wrong.

Amazingly, the pilot managed to avoid hitting power lines and rear-ending any cars on crowded I-10. All that happened was that commuter rubberneckers jammed traffic as they slowed down to see the plane crashed on the side of the highway.

Jacksonville aviation accident attorneys are thankful that nobody was injured as airplane crashes usually have a much more tragic outcome.

Fortunately, there were no school children on a school bus during an early morning accident in Pinellas County, Wednesday, September 1, according to WTSP. The crash happened about 6 a.m. when a pickup truck was turning off 130th Street onto Ulmerton Road attempting to go east. He crossed westbound traffic, which included the school bus.

The bus hit the front passenger side of the pickup. Two people were inside. The driver died and the passenger was taken to Bayfront Hospital. There is no word on his or her condition or whether they were wearing seat belts. All lanes were closed for some time. The bus driver was taken away on a stretcher. There is no word on his condition at this time. Our condolences go out to the friends and family of the man driving the pickup truck.

School Bus Statistics
According to the Florida Department of Highway Safety, the training of our school bus drivers is a critical link to the safety and welfare of our students.

School buses are considered a safe mode of transportation. Between 1998 and 2002, six children died in school bus crashes in Florida. Four children were killed while loading or unloading from a school bus.

And a high percentage of the 4,830 school bus crashes were attributed to the fault of other drivers, according to the state.

In this case, we have no idea why the pickup turned in front of traffic, but it does not appear there was anything the school bus driver could have done to avoid the accident.

If you or a loved one is injured in a school bus or because of public transportation, the experienced Florida bus accident attorneys at Farah & Farah will advocate for you and determine the at-fault party that may be responsible for your injuries and compensation.