Maryland Suv Roll Over Accident Lawyer

Defective Automobile Design Or Manufacture

For several decades, Jack I. Hyatt has represented those who have been seriously injured. Through experience and education, our firm is able to expertly evaluate medical injuries and pursue personal injury claims on behalf of the injured plaintiff. Jack I. Hyatt provides sophisticated legal services for almost any type of injury, both emotional and physical.

There are approximately 4.2 million vehicle crashes each year in the United States, over 3.1 million people are injured in motor vehicle accidents and over 41,000 people are killed. Many of these accidents are not caused by driver negligence, buy by defective automobiles or defective automobile parts.

Some examples include:

SUV Rollovers: Sport utility vehicles (SUV's) are an extremely popular method of family transportation. One of every 4 vehicles currently being purchased in the United States is an SUV. With the increased popularity comes the increased probability that SUV drivers will be involved in accidents and close to 63% of all deaths occurring in SUV related accidents resulted from a rollover.

Insurance industry statistics show that people in all but the heaviest SUV's have higher death rates in single-vehicle accidents, mostly due to vehicle rollover.

Most rollover crashes occur when a vehicle runs off the road and is tripped by a ditch, curb, soft soil, or other object causing it to rollover. Lack of stability is a major factor in rollover accidents causing injury and death. NHTSA (The National Highway Transportation Safety Association) has developed rollover resistance ratings to address the issue of SUV rollover safety and they have reported that taller, narrower vehicles such as sport utility vehicles are more likely to roll once they leave the roadway.

According to NHTSA rollovers do not occur as frequently as other types of crashes but when they do occur, the results are often serious injury or death. Rollovers accounted for more than 10,000 fatalities in the United States in 1999, which is more than side and rear impact crashes combined. SUV rollovers accounted for 36% of all fatal crashes in the year 2000.

DEFECTIVE TIRES: In August of 2000, Firestone announced a recall of over 14 million tires sold in the United States. Many of these tires had been used on Ford products, including the Ford Explorer. It was determined that a belt separation in the tire was the cause of tire blow outs resulting in the loss of control over the vehicle and, in many cases, catastrophic injury and death. NHTSA (The National Highway Transportation Safety Association) determined that a defect existed in Firestone Wilderness AT P235/75R15 and P255/70R16 tires manufactured before May, 1998 and ordered the recall.

15 PASSENGER VANS: There are more than 500,000 15 passenger currently on the road and most often these vans are purchased by community organizations, schools, day-care centers, senior centers and churches as a method of transportation. These vans, when fully loaded pose a serious risk of rolling over and hundreds of deaths have resulted from 15 passenger van accidents. NHTSA has studied the rollover propensity of the vans and has issued national warnings to users of such vehicles that they have an increased risk of rollovers under certain conditions. They stated that fully loading 15 passenger vans caused the center of gravity to shift rearward and upward, increasing the likelihood of a rollover occurring. The shift also increased to potential for loss of control in panic situations. They also stated that the design of these vans was not conducive to handling side impacts and many injuries and deaths attributed to these larger vans were a result of passenger ejection.

The above are all examples of defective automobiles and automobile parts, either by design or manufacturing. If you have been involved in an accident and feel it may be due to defective automobile design or manufacture, you may have a claim for damages.

Jack I. Hyatt believes that in order to represent our injured clients in the best possible manner, our firm must have an understanding of the human anatomy and how it responds to an injury. Therefore, through experience and education, our law firm is able to expertly evaluate injuries and successfully pursue claims on behalf of the injured plaintiff.

While proving a physical, emotional, or cognitive injury can be difficult, our experienced and knowledgeable attorneys and staff are able to undertake difficult cases and prevail, convincing skeptics of the merits of a claim via credible, trustworthy evidence and objective test findings. Our firm is committed to protecting our client's rights and has repeatedly demonstrated our ability to succeed in the most challenging and complex bicycle injury cases.

410-486-1800