Truck Accidents
⚖ Truck Accidents
Houston Truck Accident Lawyer
We've all had the moment: a tractor-trailer locks up its brakes ahead of you on the highway. The brakes squeal, smoke rises from the tires, the nose of the cab dips hard under the weight — and every driver nearby instinctively pulls away, afraid the truck won't stop in time or will jackknife into a bigger wreck. That fear is justified. Because of their sheer size and weight, commercial trucks cause some of the most catastrophic injuries and deaths on Texas roads.
What sets Stilwell Injury Law apart: Tom Stilwell built the first half of his 30-year career defending trucking companies, motor carriers, and Fortune 500 corporations in commercial vehicle litigation. He knows how trucking companies investigate a crash, how their insurers respond within hours, and what their own internal safety and compliance files really show. Now he uses that same knowledge to hold trucking companies accountable for the injuries and deaths their negligence causes — representing victims and families throughout Houston and the Greater Houston area.
In most serious truck accident cases, the right defendant isn't just the driver — it's the trucking company itself. Motor carriers are legally responsible for ensuring their drivers and vehicles operate safely, and when they cut corners on hiring, training, maintenance, or hours-of-service compliance, they can and should be held liable.
⚖ Truck Accidents
What to Do After a Truck Accident
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Move to safety. If you're able, move away from traffic and out of the roadway.
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Call 911. Report the accident with as much detail as possible, including any trapped occupants, fires, fuel spills, or cargo spills.
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Check for injuries. Avoid moving anyone who's injured unless necessary to prevent further harm.
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Get medical attention — for yourself and everyone involved. Truck accidents can cause internal injuries that aren't immediately obvious, especially with adrenaline masking symptoms. Never skip an evaluation.
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Call your family. Let them know what happened, and if you're being taken to a hospital, ask the EMTs which one so your family can meet you there.
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Take photos, if it's safe to do so, of:
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The final resting position of all vehicles
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Any cargo that spilled from the truck
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Skid marks on the roadway
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License plates on both the truck cab and trailer
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Logos on the truck cab and trailer
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The police investigating the scene
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Photograph the truck driver's commercial driver's license, insurance information, and any paperwork identifying their employer, if possible.
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Get witness information. Names, phone numbers, and addresses of anyone who saw the accident or arrived shortly after.
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Call a Houston truck accident lawyer at Stilwell Injury Law. We're available day or night at (832) 274-6749.
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Call your own insurance company to report the accident, even if it wasn't your fault.
Do Big Rigs Follow Different Laws Than Passenger Vehicles?
Yes. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), part of the U.S. Department of Transportation, regulates commercial motor vehicles on weight limits, driver rest periods, hours-of-service limits, loading requirements, and vehicle maintenance standards. Texas also issues specific commercial driver's licenses (CDLs) governed in part by federal requirements.
On top of these federal rules, truck drivers must follow the same state and local traffic laws as everyone else — no speeding, no following too closely, no unsafe lane changes, no ignoring traffic signals. When a commercial driver breaks both federal trucking regulations and ordinary traffic law, it strengthens a negligence claim significantly.
Human Error Causes Truck Accidents
Driver negligence is one of the leading causes of serious truck accidents. Common causes of driver error and distraction include:
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Lack of experience or insufficient training
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Failing to check blind spots
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Fumbling with GPS or mapping devices
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Texting while driving
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Reading email or company messages while driving
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Talking on the phone
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Watching videos while driving
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Eating while driving
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Fatigue and boredom
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Driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs
Trucking companies are constantly recruiting new drivers, and too often, a driver with a bare CDL is put behind the wheel with nothing more than the minimal training needed to pass licensing requirements — not the real-world experience needed to safely operate an 80,000-pound vehicle. Insufficient training and inexperience are recurring factors in serious truck accidents.
The FMCSA bans texting while driving for all commercial drivers, but the practice persists because drivers feel pressure to stay in constant contact with dispatchers and customers. Similarly, federal hours-of-service rules limit how long a driver can be on the road without rest — but drivers under pressure to beat traffic, weather delays, or a company deadline often push past those limits, causing the very fatigue-related accidents the rules exist to prevent.
Truck Size and Weight Cause Truck Accidents
A fully loaded tractor-trailer can legally weigh up to 80,000 pounds. Under ideal conditions at 65 mph, that much weight takes roughly 525 feet to stop — nearly the length of two football fields. That size and weight alone leaves little room for error when a sudden stop is required.
Commercial trucks also use air brakes rather than the hydraulic brakes on passenger vehicles, which introduces a lag time between when the driver hits the brake and when the brakes fully engage. Combined with the added stopping distance from sheer weight, that lag can be the difference between a near-miss and a catastrophic collision — and every mile per hour over the speed limit adds meaningfully to the distance a truck needs to stop safely.
Maintenance Failures Cause Truck Accidents
Federal law requires rigorous inspection and maintenance of commercial trucks, but FMCSA studies consistently identify brake, tire, and tire-pressure problems as leading mechanical causes of truck accidents. Poorly maintained brake and coupling systems increase stopping distance and raise the risk of a jackknife or loss of control during an emergency stop — often in the exact moment a driver needs the truck to perform at its best.
Shifting or Improperly Secured Cargo Causes Truck Accidents
An overloaded or improperly balanced load changes a truck's center of gravity and handling. A sudden cargo shift can jackknife a tractor-trailer, overturn a trailer, or cause a total loss of control. On flatbed trailers, failed strapping can send cargo directly into the roadway, creating hazards for everyone nearby. Tanker trucks are especially prone to rollovers because of their high center of gravity, and a shifting liquid or hazardous chemical load can turn a routine turn into a serious — sometimes toxic — spill.
FMCSA regulations require trucking companies to secure cargo properly using tiedowns, dunnage, shoring bars, wedges, chocks, or similar devices, and hold the company, its officers, and its drivers responsible for compliance.
Establishing Fault Requires Experience and Investigation
Determining who's responsible for a truck accident takes more than a police report. Our attorneys go back to the scene to measure skid marks, evaluate roadway conditions, and examine impact and witness marks.
We move quickly to obtain a court order to access and download the truck's electronic control module (ECM) or electronic data recorder (EDR) — often called the truck's “black box” — which can capture data from the moments before, during, and after a crash, including:
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Speed
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Engine RPM
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Braking
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Rate of acceleration or deceleration
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Length of time driving and idle time
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Fuel consumption
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Seatbelt engagement
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Airbag deployment
In the hands of an experienced attorney and accident reconstruction expert, this data can establish pre-crash vehicle dynamics, driver inputs, collision timing, crash signature, restraint usage, and post-crash automatic collision notification (ACN) data.
We also evaluate weather conditions, consulting meteorological experts where needed, and subpoena the trucking company's driver logs, maintenance records, and cargo loading and inspection records to determine whether FMCSA regulations were followed — and who could have prevented the accident. Driver hours-of-service logs, whether kept on paper or through Electronic Logging Devices (ELDs), are especially critical when fatigue may have played a role.
⚖ Free & Confidential Consultation
Call Stilwell Injury Law for a Free, Confidential Consultation
Trucking companies carry substantial insurance coverage — often millions of dollars — specifically to protect themselves after a serious accident, and their insurers keep a list of defense attorneys they call within hours of a crash. You need a Houston truck accident lawyer who moves just as fast, and who knows exactly how those insurers and defense teams operate — because Tom Stilwell used to be one of them.
The sooner you call, the more evidence we can preserve on your behalf. We work on a contingency fee basis: if we don't recover for you, you owe us nothing.
Call (832) 274-6749 or email tom@tsinjurylaw.com for a free, confidential consultation.