Gair, Gair, Conason, Rubinowitz, Bloom, Hershenhorn, Steigman & Mackauf is a New York Plaintiff's personal injury law firm specializing in automobile accidents, construction accidents, medical malpractice, products liability, police misconduct and all types of New York personal injury litigation.

Articles Posted in Auto Accidents

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teen driverCar accidents are the number one cause of teen fatalities and disability in the US. Close to 2,000 young drivers between 15 and 20 year old die in car crashes every year. This doesn’t include the deaths of passengers riding with teens or other road users including cyclists and pedestrians who died in traffic accidents caused by teens.  A majority of auto accidents caused by teens are related to lack of scanning, speeding and distraction such as using a cell phone or travelling with other teen passengers.

Based on analysis of previous teen accidents, the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles tested a portable driver simulator system that has the ability to predict with accuracy which teen will pass the on-road exam and which one will fail. Additionally the simulator can highlight which driving errors are associated with failing the test.

The simulator was originally developed by researchers at the Children Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) who created  a laboratory-based driving assessment that safely put teen drivers in common crash scenarios and measure their skills at avoiding accidents.  As the development appeared to be successful, CHOP created a spin off called Diagnostic Driving to commercialize the technology.  The product is  now in a pilot stage in the form of a cloud-based software application called Ready-Assess™.

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accident scene175 people died in auto accidents in New York City between January 1st and October 4th 2020 according to a recent article in the New York Post. Last year 169 people died during the same period of time. These numbers might seem pretty similar however the situation  in 2020 was vey different from 2019. For 3 months New Yorkers were required to quarantine and stay home in 2020.  As a result a decline in fatalities should have been expected but instead fatalities increased. The empty roads became much more dangerous than usual with road users engaging in risky behavior such as speeding.  Yesterday we blogged about the surge in bicycle accidents in the city but bicyclists are not the only category of roads users that experienced a surge in fatalities. 38 motorcyclists died so far compared to 37 for the same period of 2019 and 50 car occupants died in NYC crashes so far compared to 22 for the same period of 2019. This is more than the double. Many of the car occupant’s fatalities are related to speeding but as traffic in the city is returning back to normal, now another problem has appeared: a rise in cyclist deaths.  Sadly this doesn’t come as a surprise. Street safety activists and the media have been pointing at both issues, speeding and a rise in cyclists, for months.

Mayor de Blasio self destroyed his Vision Zero legacy

Mayor de Blasio who successfully launched Vision Zero at the beginning of 2014, not only ignored recommendations of his Surface Transportation Advisory Council to address the new challenges created by the covid-19 crisis but additionally slashed the Vision Zero budget (see previous article in New York Post).

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2 years ago, 12 year old Andrew McMorris was killed in a car accident caused by a drunk driver. The driver was identified as Thomas Murphy. At the time of the accident, the young Andrew was walking with a group of scouts along the shoulder of Davide Terry Road in Manorville, Long Island, NY, when Thomas Murphy struck them with his car. Thomas died in the accident and several other boy scouts were injured.

Murphy had been drinking vodka for several hours at his golf club before the fatal car accident

Prior to the accident, Murphy had been boozing on vodka at his golf club. He got behind the wheel despite the advise of several of his friends not to take his car. After the accident he refused to take the breathalyzer test. However a blood test effectuated four hours  later indicated a alcohol level of .13, well above the limit of  .08 allowed  by law.

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A 32 year-old woman died in a car accident in New York on Saturday. Jolenna Favor who lives in Far Rockaway was a passenger in a BMW driven by 35 year old Nicholas Thompson. Thompson was not supposed to be on the road driving the car as his license was previously revoked in 2011 following several drunk driving arrests. He was arrested a first time in Queens in 2008, then in Nassau County in 2011 when his license was taken away from him. He was caught drunk driving again in 2015 despite his license being revoked.

On Saturday a little bit before 7 pm, Thompson was drunk driving again. He was speeding down Rockaway Boulevard near Nassau County Boulevard with his friend Jolenna Favor in the passenger seat. At one point, just before the accident, an unmarked NYPD car had to swerve to avoid him then he lost control of his car and crashed into a fence in the middle of the trees.

When EMS arrived they found Jolenna dead in the passenger seat. She died from severe head and body trauma. Thompson survived. The two undercover cops that he almost hit saw him getting out of his car and alleged that his breath smelled of alcohol and that his eyes were bloodshot and watery. He refused a blood test but admitted that he was drunk driving.

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A FDNY fire truck crashed into an ambulance killing the patient and injuring 11 others. The truck accident occurred on Thursday around 12:50 am. An ambulance transporting 59 year old Jamil Almansouri, a patient with a cardiac emergency was rushing North on Throop Avenue with its lights and sirens on. As the ambulance crossed the intersection of Myrtle Ave, a FDNY truck responding to a call for an apartment fire with all sirens and lights on as well, t-boned the ambulance. The patient flew across the ambulance and died. Almansouri was a Yemeni immigrant who owned a neighborhood bodega in Brooklyn and known by everybody as “Mike”. His sister, Granna Ahmad, who was in the ambulance with him survived, however she suffered multiple personal injuries including a broken back and two broken legs. She also lost all her teeth. The medical technician who was in the back with the deceased victim and his sister also suffered serious injury. The driver of the ambulance was hospitalized and required surgery for a serious leg injury. Six firefighters were also taken to to the hospital as well as two other people who were in a car waiting at a traffic light and whose car was also struck in the crash.

The firemen received a call at 12:43 initially reporting that people were trapped in a building. 6 minutes later the ambulance picked up Alamsouri who was in critical condition and took off for Woodhull Medical Center. Two minutes later, both vehicles crashed into each other, 3 blocks away from the  apartment fire. Thankfully, only one resident was living in the building and he was able to escape on his own.

According to preliminary investigations, the ambulance had the green light while the fire truck had the red light. However both vehicles had the right to bypass the light as they were both responding to a 911 emergency.  Some protruding scaffolding on a building near the intersection might have blocked the view of the fire truck driver.

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accident sceneA man who was drunk behind the wheels crashed his car into a telephone pole. His son who was in the car with him was critically injured  and rushed to the hospital where he died five days later. The man refused to surrender and the police had to track him down, He was arrested two weeks later and charged in an 18-count indictment including manslaughter.

The accident occurred on August 26th around 6:50 am. 34 year old Victor Mitchell from Central Avenue in Albany, was driving his Honda with his son in Far Rockaway when he crashed his car into a telephone pole. His 8 year old son, Sincere, was on board. When the police arrive they found that Mitchell had a blood alcohol content of .118. He also tested positive for Marijuana.

Tragic death

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accident scene4 people died  and several others were injured in a car crash on a Long Island highway in an area nicknamed by locals “Blood Alley” for the many car accidents that previously occurred in this specific area of North Massapequa, NY . The accident caused by a wrong-way driver occurred early morning, around 5:00 am yesterday.

For reasons that are still unknown, 33-year-old Marvin Balcaseres from Farmingdale, NY, entered the Southern State Parkway the wrong way, most probably at exit 30 or exit 31 according to preliminary investigations. He traveled for about a minute before crashing into a SUV driven by 67 year old Ruben Sanchez who was heading to work with three other passengers identified as 34 -year-old Ivis Sanchez Cordova, 56-year-old Edith Magana and 44 year old Nadina Sanchez-Cordova.  The wrong way driver as well as all the occupants of the SUV, except Nadina Sanchez-Cordova, died at the scene of the crash. Nadina was rushed to the hospital in critical condition.

Another car was also hit by the wrong way driver. Thankfully the driver wasn’t hurt. A motorcyclist who tried to avoid the area of the crash was hit by debris and sustained minor injuries.

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Auto Accident NYC Injuries Deaths June 2020During the Covid-19 lock-down, NYC car accident deaths and motorcyclist deaths related to reckless behavior, mostly speeding, increased. City officials were expecting fatalities to go down as the city was getting more active again but statistics show that instead traffic accident fatalities surged after the lock-down.

As a result the DOT announced yesterday that it was lowering the city speed limit from 30 mph to 25 mph on the most dangerous roads of the 5 New York City boroughs on:

  • Riverside  Drive from 165th street to 181st street in Manhattan
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construction worker is a police officerHighway construction workers have one of of the highest rate of fatality among all categories of construction workers. Too often, they die in accidents caused by reckless drivers. In New York State,  from May to November, the New York State Police and the New York State Department of Transportation  are joining forces to crack down on reckless drivers in highway construction zone areas. Through “Operation Hard Hat”, any highway construction workers could actually be a State trooper checking on your driving behavior near construction zones and communicating with other state troopers down the road to stop and ticket drivers who do not respect construction workers safety.

State troopers are sometimes taking the role of a flagman or could be seated in a truck checking your speed  or checking if you are using a cellphone

This year so far, according to a recent announcement by governor Cuomo, 37 operations have been conducted on New York State highways resulting in 432 speeding tickets, 112 seat-belts tickets, 192 cell phone tickets, 68 move over tickets, 2 failure to obey flagger tickets, 10 failure to obey traffic control device tickets, 1 DWI violation, 2 unsafe lane change tickets and 403 tickets for other violations. A total of  1,222 tickets were issued so far. Last year, the same campaign from May to November resulted in a total of 1,048 tickets.

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location of the fatal tractor trailer truck accidentA mother and her two children lost their lives and several other family members suffered personal injury in a truck accident in Upstate NY.

The accident occurred last night around 8:30 pm on the New York State Thruway near Exit 19 for Ulster. A family from Pelham Bay in the Bronx, NYC, was returning home from a trip Upstate in two separate cars: a Honda and a Kia minivan. Both cars were stopped in traffic when a truck rear ended the Honda and swiped the rear end of the Kia. Zulika Salim, a 47 year old mother was sitting on the back seat of the Honda with her two children, 19 year old Justin Gayapersad and 14 year old Chelsea Gayapersad. They all died in the crash. The driver of the Honda, 24 year old Neta Singh and the front seat passenger, 18 year old Singh suffered minor injuries and were transported to a local hospital hospital.  3 other family members who were travelling in the Kia minivan that the truck sideswiped also suffered personal injury. One of them, a 48 year old passenger identified as Ramnarine Singh, was seriously injured and had to be airlifted to a medical center in Albany. Two other passengers, 27 year old Sangeeta Singh and 45 year old Saleema Salim suffered minor injuries and were transported to a local hospital. The driver of the Kia Van, 26 year old Maheshwarnauth Karan declined medical treatment at the scene of the accident.

The truck driver was identified as 61 year old Luc Leblanc from Quebec. According to the police, the truck driver was driving in the right lane when he encountered traffic stopped in front of him. He tried to avoid a collision but the distance between the truck and the stopped cars was too short for the truck to stop and he rear-ended the Honda. He was not injured in the accident and so far he has not been charged by the police.

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