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 personal injury nyc

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10 pedestrians, 8 passengers and 6 drivers died in crashes in New York City in February. No cyclists fatalities were reported to the NYPD during this month. 266 bus accidents, 577 truck accidents and 56 motorcycle accidents were reported among the total 7,261 motor vehicle collisions recorded in February.

Traffic accident fatalities in New York City reached a record high for the month of February with 24 people dying in traffic accidents compared to respectively 10, 17, 12, 16, 13, 18, 15, 12 and 20 in February 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014 and 2013.  Traffic accident fatalities in the city last February were even higher than what they were in February 2013 before Vision Zero started.  The  trendline which had been steadily declining during Vision Zero is now almost flat. Since last February ,monthly car accident fatalities have been at the level of the trendline or above which is quite unusual and quite worrisome.

Car accident fatalities February 22
The high number of car accident fatalities in New York City last February is mostly due to a record high number of car passengers fatalities (see category in red in the graph below, click on it for full size). 8 motor vehicle passengers died in crashes last February compared to 5 in January 2020 and 2 in February 2021. Since Vision Zero started and even a year before, the highest total monthly passengers fatalities were 6 in April 2014 and 6 in July 2015.

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fall prevention posterLast year, 7 out of the 9 NYC construction worker deaths reported by the Department of Buildings were caused by falls. Additionnally the DOB also reported that 194 workers were injured in fall accidents on New York City construction sites during the same period. This was a record high compared to the previous years (see previous blog). Despite increased safety training requirements for workers, fall remains the number one cause of accident deaths and injuries in the New York construction industry and nationally as well. According to the most recent statistics from the BLS 351 out of the 1,008 construction fatalities recorded nationally in 2020 were fall fatalities. Most of these accidents were preventable.

Preventing fall accidents is the reason why, every year, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration in collaboration with multiple other partners involved in workplace safety such as the CPWR and NORA are organizing a National Stand Down during which employers are invited to voluntarily take a break from work and sit down with their workers to discuss or participate to activities  related to fall hazards.

Anyone can participate and every year sees more and more participants from major corporate construction companies to small contractors, including the US Army and other governmental participants. All employers  participating receive a certificate.

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location where the car jumped the curb in Brooklyn6 pedestrians were injured in a car accident in NYC yesterday morning. A driver jumped the curb at the intersection of St. Johns Place and Nostrand Avenue in Brooklyn, a little bit before 8:00 am. This is the time during which parents are bringing their children to school. A video below shows one of the victims crossing the street with his two children just before the driver looses control of his vehicle and jumps the curb at a high rate of speed. The 48 year old father and his two sons that are 9 year old and 11 year old were struck by the car. They sustained serious injuries but are in stable condition. Another woman got pinned between the car and a pole. A total of 5 people were rushed to the hospital with serious injuries and another person was treated at the scene for minor injuries. The police arrested the driver of the car but it is not clear if he will be charged. The accident occurred just one day after the police announced that the mother who was struck by a driver jumping the curb in Harlem a week earlier had died from her injuries, leaving behind her 6 year old son. (see previous blog) .

Earlier during the week, 7 people were injured in a car accident that occurred on the Brooklyn Bridge. The crash involved multiple cars and according to witnesses was “surreal”. A vehicle went airborne. A driver was critically injured after being ejected from his car.  6 other people were seriously injured and transported to the hospital. Tourists who were walking on the bridges aid they witnessed a horrific scene of wrecked cars and multiple bodies lying all over the ground.  The police is still investigating the accident and said that previous to the crash the man who was ejected from his car was driving his white jeep at a high rate of speed but so far they could not confirm that he caused the accident. Read more in News Week

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location of the MTA and scooter accidetn in Ridgewood Queens NYCA 15 year old boy riding a scooter in Queens NYC was critically injured in an accident with a MTA BUS. So far the police are still investigating the accident and did not provide any information as how the collision occurred. The NYPD only said that the boy was riding the electric scooter near the intersection of Seneca and Gates Aves. in Ridgewood (see picture) when he was struck by the bus. He suffered severe body trauma and was rushed to the hospital.  (read more in the NY Daily News)

Motorcyclist injured in hit and run has to investigate his own accident

Another motorcyclist was injured last week-end after he was struck  by a hit and run driver who pulled out of a parking space and struck him. A surveillance video shows 35 year old Franck Guzman riding his motorcycle south bound on Boston Road when a driver  pulling out of a parking area and crossing though traffic hit him. Guzman went flying in the air while the driver sped away and disappeared. Guzman could not stand up and was transported to the hospital to be treated. The police told him they would come to see him but never showed up.

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location of the Harlem accidentA mother and her son were critically injured in a horrific car accident in NYC yesterday afternoon that was caught on video surveillance (see below) .The 38 year-old mother was walking and holding the hand of her 6 year old son on a  Harlem sidewalk when the driver of a car lost control of his vehicle, jumped the curb at high speed and mowed them down. They were both critically injured and rushed to the hospital. The 69-year-old driver driver was also injured and according to the police he might have suffered a medical episode.

The accident occurred in the middle of the afternoon right by the West 145th Street and Malcolm X Boulevard bus stop. The video surveillance shows the red car jumping the curb and driving on the sidewalk at a high rate of speed  right behind the unsuspicious mom and her son.  After hitting them, the car then destroyed a flower shop and a few other vehicles.

Witnesses are still horrified by what they saw and are still wondering what can be done to prevent such horrifying accidents. Police are still investigating the accident and at this point it is still unclear what kind of medical episode the driver suffered.

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Construction accident fatalities and injuries in New York City in 2021 were a little bit higher than in 2020 but lower than during the years preceding the Covid19 crisis according to the New York City Department of Buildings statistics.  The DOB only reports construction worker fatalities that are caused by  building code violations. Brooklyn and Manhattan had the most fatalities, 3 each while the other boroughs all recorded one fatality each for a total of 9 worker fatalities compared to 8 in 2020 and 11 in 2019.

Construction accident deaths NYC 2021
7 out of the 9 hard hat deaths were caused by fall and 2 of them were caused by accidents related to mechanical construction equipment failure. Despite construction workers now being required to follow safety training, fall related fatalities were at their highest since 2017. Most fall accidents are preventable. They usually occur when safety rules are not respected.

Factors in New York construction worker deaths in 2021
Almost the same number of injuries were reported to the DOB in 2021 compared to 2020. 505 workers were injured in construction accidents in New York City in 2021 compared to 502 a year earlier and 596 in 2019. Most injuries’ occurred on Manhattan construction sites (300) followed by Brooklyn (105), Bronx (48), Queens (45) and Staten Island (7).

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657 pedestrians, 161 cyclists, 870 passengers and 1,429 motorists were injured in motor vehicle accidents in New York City last January. 19 other road users died in crashes the same month, including 11 pedestrians, 5 passengers and 3 motorists. This is the highest number of fatalities for a month of January since January 2019 and the highest it ever got during a month and more than half of them were motorists. Last year during the same month, 13 people were killed in traffic accidents in the city.

auto accident fatalities NYC January 22
auto accident deaths by category of road users New York January 22
The total number of  people injured in motor vehicle accidents in January 2022 in the city was a little higher than in January 2021 when it reached 3,028 however this number remained lower than numbers recorded during the months of January before the pandemic.  The graph below illustrates well the seasonality of car accident injuries with the month of January being usually a month during which there are less injuries reported than during the summer months. The graph also shows a big drop during the lockdown.

Motorists and passengers are the two categories of road users that usually sustained the most injuries of all auto accidents reported in the city.

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location of the Bronx fatal dump truck accidentA 76 year old pedestrian was fatally struck by a dump truck in the Bronx, NYC, on Monday morning. 76 year old Lola Blair was crossing Enstein Loop around 11:45 am when she was hit by a dump truck making a left turn from the Hutchinson River Parkway service road onto Einstein Loop.  The dump truck driver first continued to drive but then returned to the scene of the accident. The woman was rushed to the hospital where she died from her injuries. She was living nearby, in Co-op city.

Drivers, especially truck drivers must exercise due care when driving in residential areas but so far the NYPD did not charge the dump truck driver for failure to exercise due care.

On Friday another pedestrian was fatally struck by a garbage truck in Brooklyn ( see previous blog).

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location of the two houses destroyed in the crash6 people were injured and two houses were destroyed after a car driver lost control of his vehicle and crashed into a residential building in Staten Island. The driver, identified as 38-year-old Mark Robles, was initially pulled over by the police for a broken brake light. One of the officers said he  saw a crack pipe in the car and the police attempted to get the man out of the car. Robles did not comply and sped away behind the wheels of his 2007 Jeep Patriot and the police started to chase him.

Residents were sleeping when the jeep crashed in their house

The chase took place at 3:30 am on Thursday morning during a rainstorm. Robles sped down on St Pauls Avenue, hit a patch of water, skidded, rotated 360 degrees and ended crashing into two houses located at the intersection of St Pauls and Van Duzer Street. 6 people suffered minor injuries.

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Reckless driving  and speeding caused 6 people to die and several to be injured in multiple car accidents all over the city. On Monday early morning, around 2:00 am, a black BMW landed on the Amtrak tracks below the Henry Hudson parkway around 183rd Street. The driver lost control of the vehicle and went over the barriers of the highway. When the car landed on the tracks it exploded, killing the driver and the passenger. The police was seen at the scene investigating the accident while Amtrak published a service advisory signaling delays for the trains travelling between Pen Station and Albany.

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