Four teenagers died in a Missouri car accident on June 6 near the Daviess-Grundy County line. This was the second quadruple, fatal car crash in northwest Missouri in 2017.
The deadly Missouri car accident happened at 1:40 PM when the driver of a 1994 Isuzu Rodeo was going east on Missouri Highway 190 when the vehicle ran off the road and overturned.
The Missouri State Police reported that they did not know the speed of the vehicle when it left the roadway yet, but it stated that this was a very common type of single car accident. When a vehicle leaves the road, often due to distracted driving, the driver then overcorrects and the car skids off the road on the other side, and flips over.
All occupants of the vehicle were pronounced dead later that evening at the county coroner’s office.
The state police also noted that one of the biggest killers in Missouri for those 15-19 is car accidents. It is very important for teenaged drivers to drive responsibly and to never be distracted from their driving.
Our View
Our personal injury attorneys do not know for sure what caused the crash, but a car that drifts off the road with a young driver and three young passengers could have been due to some form of distracted driving.
- Only use your cell phone for an emergency when driving. Even in an emergency, you still should pull over before picking up the cell phone. Just a second’s distraction from the road can be deadly.
- If you are sleepy, pull over! Being drowsy increases your crash risk by four times.
- Limit the number of passengers in the car. It is very common for young drivers to be distracted from the road by having other teens in the vehicle. Driving with friends can easily distract the young driver from important driving tasks.
- Do not eat and drive. Eating on the road might save time, but it also can be deadly.
- Do not be distracted by multi-tasking behind the wheel. Do not do anything that distracts your eyes from the road.
Our personal injury attorneys have handled cases where clients died due to the negligence of a distracted driver, such as this $3.5 million wrongful death settlement. We want to remind all drivers to never drive distracted and to always keep their eyes on the road. Nothing is more important than getting to your destination safely.
One Comment
Mark Brisson
Most are familiar with accidents/crashes that occur with teens and their driving. However, there is also an issue with company/fleet vehicles. These vehicles spend more time on the road than personal vehicles. Because the driver is on the clock and working, they will try to “multi-task” and do work other than driving when they are behind the wheel. Emails, phone calls, using apps and texting are often part of a drivers’ workload.
While many states and legislators are seeking to lower distracted driving by increasing penalties, fees and regulations, there is another option. AT&T “It Can Wait” campaign is an advocacy effort to diminish distracted driving. They have an anti-texting app to be downloaded onto your smartphones. The app is called AT&T DriveMode. They make it available to all drivers for FREE!
One area that is rarely discussed is that Missouri has hundreds of State vehicles that inspectors, regulators and the agricultural department use as fleet vehicles, but they do not have the technology to diminish distracted driving. I would love to see Missouri lead by example and use a program, like FleetMode, to block texts, redirect incoming phone calls, and impede all other apps in the State vehicles. If we want our state roads to be safer, let’s start by making our state vehicles safer.
Comments for this article are closed.