Bicycling offers many benefits. It is health-enhancing, inexpensive, and climate friendly. However, statistics show that Maryland can be a dangerous place for bicyclists. Each year, an average of 789 bicyclists are involved in accidents. More than four of every five (80%) of those collisions injure or kill the bicyclist.
In other words, if you have been involved in any type of bicycle crash, you likely have suffered some form of harm, from requiring medical attention to missed work to pain and suffering. You may be entitled to compensation for those losses, and an experienced Maryland bicycle accident lawyer can help you do that.
The risks to bicyclists involved in collisions with passenger or commercial vehicles come down to basic science. On average, a bicycle and bicyclist weight around 200 pounds. An average passenger car weights more than 4,000 pounds, and commercial trucks weight several times that number. In an impact, the force exerted on a bicyclist is exponentially greater than that on an occupant of a car or truck. That, plus the inherent reality of the bicyclist’s greater physical exposure, place a bicyclist at great peril.
Why Bicycle Crashes Occur
Bicycle accidents happen for a variety of reasons. However, many of these collisions are the result of failures by the car/truck driver involved. A lot of bicycle crashes happen because the car/truck driver simply never saw the bicyclist. The driver may have been speeding, inattentive, distracted, impaired, or simply failed to maintain the careful lookout that the law demands of everyone on the road.
Sometimes, the driver is not actually driving. “Dooring” is a name for accidents where the driver or passenger in a parked vehicle opens his/her door into the path of an oncoming bicyclist. Statistics show that urban bicyclists are at especially high risk of injury from a dooring accident, with cities like Chicago and San Francisco reporting anywhere from 1-in-6 (16%) to 1-in-5 (20%) of all bicycle accidents deriving from dooring events.
Other times, the flaw at issue is not a car/truck driver’s negligence; in fact, no driver, passenger, or vehicle may have been involved at all. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the third most common cause of bicycle accidents, accounting for 1 in every 8 crashes, involves a bicyclist felled by a roadway hazard because the road was not maintained or repaired properly.
Bicycle Accident Lawsuits
If you are injured aboard your bicycle, having a skilled Maryland bicycle accident attorney is crucial. The right legal team can help you during and before litigation. An experienced lawyer will know how to investigate the crash promptly, thoroughly, and effectively, to get the forensic evidence you will need to demonstrate that the driver (or the road surface) caused the collision.
Additionally, accumulating the right evidence can help establish that you acted reasonably and prudently aboard your bicycle at all times. That is vital in Maryland. This state is one of only five to follow the rule of “contributory negligence” in injury accident cases. This rule says that, if you were negligent to any extent and your negligence contributed to the crash — even if you were only 1% at fault — you recover nothing. Having an abundance of powerful evidence can help not only show that the driver or roadway was negligent/defective but also illustrate that you were entirely blameless in causing the accident.
Amassing and developing this evidence (and a powerful presentation based upon it) require a lot things. You need an advocate who has the resources and diligence to act promptly before things like crash scene evidence are lost. You need someone who is detail-oriented to conduct the pretrial discovery to unearth all the helpful proof available to you (and to leave “no stone unturned.”) You also need someone who is experienced in dealing insurance companies, opposing attorneys, courts, and — when necessary — juries. Last, but far from least, you need an attorney who can evaluate your case accurately and give you a reliable sense of what your lawsuit is “worth” monetarily. At each of these junctures in the process, the Maryland bicycle accident attorneys at the office of Anthony A. Fatemi, LLC can help. Our team will perform a careful assessment and then lay out your options, including the best plan seeking justice. Contact us at (301) 857-4914, or complete our online contact form today to schedule your consultation.
Fill out the contact form or call us at (301) 857-4914 to schedule your complimentary consultation.
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