There are certain trends in motor vehicle collisions. When looking at the data collected from multiple crashes, it is possible to find common factors. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) carefully reviews collision reports to determine the underlying cause of collisions.
When looking at collisions where the commercial truck is technically at fault, there are several issues that are more common than others. Drivers making the wrong mistakes or failing to monitor their surroundings are the two top causes of semi-truck collisions. The third is non-performance, which is a term that confuses many people. Non-performance causes roughly 12% of the collisions where a semi-truck is at fault.
Non-performance involves an inability to drive
Driver non-performance typically occurs in one of two main scenarios. The first and likely more common is that the driver falls asleep at the wheel. Fatigued drivers who work long hours may succumb to exhaustion and highway hypnosis. Even if they only fall asleep for a few minutes, that can have catastrophic consequences for others on the road.
The second source of non-performance is a personal medical emergency. Cardiac events, strokes and a host of other medical emergencies can render a commercial driver incapable of maintaining control of a semi-truck. Drivers who are asleep or experiencing an emergency may go off the road, jackknife their vehicles or cross the center line into an oncoming lane of traffic.
Seeking financial compensation from the driver or their employer is reasonable when non-performance leads to a semi-truck collision. Especially if truck driver fatigue is to blame, the people affected by a crash may have grounds to take legal action.