Commercial truck drivers work long shifts. Many times, they are on the road for as long as the law allows, which is substantially more than eight hours. They also have personal and financial obligations to attend to before and after they work.
Especially when truck drivers are near the end of a shift or are on a long, monotonous stretch of highway, drowsiness and fatigue are serious safety issues. Sometimes, truck drivers doze off completely due to fatigue. Other times, they may experience microsleeps that they don’t even realize occur, which can also create the risk of a crash.
What is microsleep?
Microsleep is a physiological response to serious fatigue. People who are exhausted can doze off for a few seconds and wake back up without even realizing they lost consciousness. Generally speaking, microsleep lasts less than 30 seconds.
Microsleep may seem like a minor issue, but it can cause devastating crashes. A few seconds can be enough time for a truck driver to swerve into another lane of traffic or otherwise lose control of the semi-truck.
Microsleep is a safety concern for any driver who is tired, but especially for those in control of unwieldy commercial trucks. If a truck driver falls asleep and causes a crash, they may not admit that fatigue caused the collision. However, evidence of their unsafe driving can be enough reason to hold them or their employer accountable.
Semi-truck collisions often lead to complicated insurance claims and even personal injury lawsuits due to the damage they cause. Discussing semi-truck crash circumstances with a personal injury attorney can make it easier for injured people to seek compensation accordingly.
