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 Tagged with new york personal injury

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accident sceneA pedestrian in a wheelchair was seriously injured after being hit by a cab in New York. The elderly man whose identity wasn’t revealed was in a motorized wheelchair on Park Ave near 86th street when the taxi struck him. The accident occurred yesterday afternoon around 2 pm. The cab driver stayed at the scene of the accident. The NY Daily News indicates that he was taken into custody for a charge not related to the accident.

Over the summer several accidents involving yellow cabs occurred on the Upper East Side. On September 14th a woman died after being hit by two consecutive yellow cabs on Lexington between 68th and 69th street (see previous blog). In August, a family who was brunching at the corner of 85th and Second Ave was almost killed after two cabs collided (see previous blog).  In July, 80 year old Barbara Horn was killed by a yellow taxi while she was in the crosswalk. The taxi was making a left turn from third Ave onto 70th street (see previous blog).

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bicyclist and truck accident New York locationA cyclist suffered personal injury after being hit by a truck in New York yesterday morning. The accident occurred around 11:30 am at the intersection of West 30th Street and Seventh Ave.

A woman riding a Citi Bike and a dump truck were both waiting at the red light on 30th Street. When the light turned green, the bicyclist headed straight ahead while the truck made a right turn and hit her. The woman started to scream and the driver immediately stopped his truck. According to witnesses both the biker and the truck driver started to scream at each other. The woman was screaming “you hit me , you hit me” and the driver was screaming back at her “you were in my blind spot, you came out of nowhere! People at a nearby pizzeria ran out of the store and pulled the victim from under the truck. Her leg was badly mangled. An emergency crew arrived a little after and took her to Bellevue Hospital to be treated. She suffered serious injury to her leg but her life was not endangered. The truck driver stayed at the scene of the accident. He wasn’t charged.

The intersection at 30th Street and Seventh Ave is dangerous and was the scene of many previous accidents. According to the Vision Zero map, in 2009 3 pedestrians, 1 cyclist and 2 motorists were injured in crashes at this intersection. In 2010, 2 motorists and 1 cyclist suffered injury. In 2011, 2 pedestrians, 1 cyclist and 8 motorists were injured. In 2012, 1 motorist, 1 cyclist and 5 pedestrians were hurt in collisions at this location. In 2013, 2 pedestrians, 2 cyclists and 1 motorist were injured. In 2014 another motorist as well as 3 cyclists were injured in accidents at this intersection. In 2015, again 3 cyclists and a motorist were injured in crashes at the same location. Last year again 3 other cyclists, one pedestrian and one motorist were injured in crashes at this intersection. This year so far, before yesterday’s accident, one motorist suffered injury after an accident at this location.  Also this year a bicyclist died in a crash just a block away at the intersection of West 29th Street and 7th Avenue. In 2014 a pedestrian died in a crash on West 31st and 7th Ave.

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9 11 injured survivorsSo many people died and so many people were injured on 9/11 in New York.  Despite healing some survivors are still struggling. Some physical injuries have healed but psychological trauma remains. Many survivors have seen their consumption of alcohol increase. Many of them struggle financially. They feel socially isolated. Some of them have deep psychological trauma.

Among the 9/11 survivors many of them are volunteer workers who just came to help without using much protection. 16 years later some healed but others are still struggling.  A study entitled “Hospitalizations for asthma among adults exposed to the September 11, 2001 World Trade Center terrorist attack” was conducted by the New York City Department of Health and published last June. The study shows that in the decade after the attacks many workers who were exposed to dust and debris resulting from the collapse of the World Trade Center not only continued to suffer from asthma but  also from a high rate of co-morbid gastroesophageal reflux symptoms (GERS), post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and sinus symptoms.  The study found that co-morbid conditions, including PTSD and GERS, are associated with an increase in asthma hospitalizations, as are female gender, black and Hispanic race/ethnicity and lower levels of education.

Another study published this year and conducted by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene and by The Department of Epidemiology, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University looks at Chronic Diseases. In “Injury, intense dust exposure, and chronic disease among survivors of the World Trade Center terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001“, Howard E. Alper , Shengchao Yu S, Steven D Stellman and Robert M Brackbill found that acute exposure to 9/11 dusts led to significant long term heart and respiratory diseases.

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25 firefighters were injured in a fire in New York. 23 of them had to be hospitalized and 2 of them were treated at the scene of the accident according to AM New York. No civilians were injured. The fire started in the lower level of a large Tribeca commercial and residential building located at the corner of Church and Murray at the end of the afternoon last Friday. The FDNY is still investigating the cause of the fire. According to the Gothamist, the fire was ignited in the kitchen of a restaurant located on the ground floor and quickly spread into the duct work and the rest of the building. Heavy black smoke came out of the building and spread through the financial district. The fire that began as a two-alarm fire turned into a 6-alarm one necessitating 200 firefighters to respond.  The Post indicates that the building had 3 unresolved fire safety violations from 8 months ago:

  1. failure to provide a fire-alarm system.
  2. inappropriate fire exit.
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crash location3 people were injured in a car accident in New York early this morning. Around 1 AM this morning, a black sedan and a grey SUV  were driving South on Park Avenue.  They collided in front of a construction site on 85th street that occupied the right lane of Park Avenue. Speed may have been a factor. The collision was extremely violent and both cars were mangled. The driver of the SUV is in critical condition while the other driver and passenger of the sedan were also  seriously injured. The police are still investigating the exact cause of the accident.

The accident occurred on Park Ave South at the 85th Street intersection where the road is partially obstructed by the scaffolding of a construction site. According to CBS  News New York, it is the second accident that occurred near the construction site. Last month a construction worker was hit by a car at the same location.

picture of the crash location:courtesy of Google

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A construction worker suffered minor injuries after collapsing at a construction site in Manhattan yesterday morning. The man was in a hard to reach area  of a construction site located at 348 West 14th Street, downtown Manhattan. The accident occurred around 9:00 am. Because of concerns about the stability of the building, firefighters had to use a tower ladder to get access to the worker and to remove him from the location where he passed out. The worker was then transported to the hospital. So far, the exact causes of the accident are unknown. However above average temperatures may have been a factor. (read more in the NY Daily News)

Every summer in America, thousands of construction workers are becoming ill because of the heat. Some even die. Here are a few guidelines that employers should make sure to follow if they want to prevent their workers from getting ill when the temperature rises:

  • New and temporary workers should always be closely monitored when starting to work during warm weather as they are the most affected by heat illnesses. Heat illnesses often occur during the first 3 days of work in the heat. One third of the fatal accidents related to heat occur on the first day of work in the heat.
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accident sceneA one year old baby suffered injuries after being hit by a yellow taxi.  The baby was sitting in a stroller next to the parents on the terrace of a restaurant  located at 85th Street and Second Avenue in the  Upper East Side of Manhattan when the accident happened. Two yellow taxis crashed into each other.  The impact caused one of the taxis to jump the curb and hit the stroller.  Two taxi passengers, a 46-year-old woman and a 9-year-old girl also suffered minor injuries. The two taxi  drivers  weren’t injured. They both jumped out of their taxis and started to argue. According to a witness, they didn’t seem to care much about the injured passengers or the family that they almost killed. Both drivers told the police that the other one didn’t have the green light. The police are still investigating the accident.  They are going to look at footage of the surveillance video camera from the restaurant to  figure out who was right and who was wrong. It was a miracle that no other pedestrians suffered  serious injury as the accident occurred during a sunny  Sunday afternoon  with terraces and sidewalks packed with people. Read more here

 

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5 people were injured in a collision between a yellow cab and a SUV in Manhattan early Wednesday morning in NYC. Two people were critically injured and two others were in serious condition, the fifth person only suffered minor injury. Among the victim was a two year old baby. An investigation is still ongoing to find out the exact cause of the accident.

The accident occurred around 1:20 am in Chelsea. The yellow taxi mini-van was driving West on 23rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. The driver was transporting two passengers, a male and a female. For reasons that are still being investigated the taxi driver rammed into an Acura MDX SUV.  A woman was driving the SUV. She had two passengers, another woman and a 2 year old child.

A witness told the New York Post that the taxi female passenger had blood all over her face while the SUV passenger and the baby seemed ok. Pictures in the New York Post show that both cars were seriously damaged. The front of the taxi was completely destroyed.

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The police are still looking for a hit and run driver who almost killed a pedestrian in New York. The 36-year-old man was crossing Riverside Drive at the intersection of West 155th Street when a speeding car hit him and sped away in the night. The pedestrian suffered a fractured skull , a broken arm and a deep laceration of his head. He was in critical condition when he arrived at the hospital but he is now stable. After the accident the police said that they were chasing the driver who hit the pedestrian. They had tried to pull the driver over for a traffic violation ten blocks away.

Police chases are triggering too many crashes and often end in killing or badly injuring innocent people like this unfortunate pedestrian.  They should very limited in New York City depending upon the reason for the pursuit.

Read more on CBS New York website

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subway accident fire nycAnother subway accident occurred on Monday morning in New York. This time, 30 feet of train track trash caught fire in a tunnel between 145th street and 133rd street in Harlem. Hundreds of panicked passengers were stuck in trains as a smoky blaze developed in the tunnel. Thousands more passengers, most of them on their way to work, were stuck waiting in overcrowded sweltering subway stations.

The fire was reported this morning at 7:18 am by a subway conductor. Trains were stopped and an order was given to the subway conductor to stop the AC to prevent the smoke from being sucked into the cars by the AC system. The service was finally restored at 9:34 am. 9 passengers had to be transported to the hospital for minor injuries related to heat and smoke.

MTA Chairman and CEO Joe Lotha apologized and said the he would increase the effort in Operation Track Sweep. This operation includes 500 employees who are supposed to maintain the tracks clear from garbage.