Polk County — 2-Vehicle Crash on U.S. 59
Posted on Wednesday, January 23rd, 2019 at 12:14 am
At around 3:30 p.m. on Monday, January 21, 2019, a 2-vehicle crash occurred on U.S. 59, about 2 miles south of FM 62.
According to preliminary investigations, a 2008 Dodge pickup was traveling north on U.S. 59 in the outside lane. Somehow, the driver of the Dodge, 56-year-old Edward Johnson, failed to control his speed and rear-ended a 2008 Kenworth truck tractor semi-trailer. Immediately after the initial crash, the Dodge drove off the roadway to the right and hit a few trees.
Johnson was not injured in the crash. There were two passengers with him: 54-year-old Hope Williams and 48-year-old Etta Skinner. Of the two, only Williams was seriously injured, so she was flown to Conroe Regional Hospital for treatment.
Uriel Gonzalez, the 30-year-old driver of the Kenworth, was also transported to a hospital, CHI St. Luke’s Hospital in Livingston, for treatment. Gonzalez had a passenger with him, but thankfully, the passenger was not injured.
It is great to hear that no one died from this terrible accident. Unfortunately, there are countless victims who aren’t as lucky. Car accidents like this are common occurrences nowadays. In fact, in a statistics done by the National Highway Traffic Administration (NHTSA), car accidents occur almost every minute of every day, and there is always a car accident that results in death every 16 minutes. This can be translated to roughly about 6 million car accidents every year and about 90 people dying in car accidents every day just in the U.S. alone.
One kind of vehicular accidents that is fairly common on its own is a rear-end collision. In fact, it is reported that there are about 1.7 million rear-end collisions on U.S. roadways every year, and from that figure, about 1,700 people die in those collisions while another 500,000 are injured. It is also reported by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) that 87% of rear-end collisions happened just because the driver wasn’t paying attention to the road.
Driving while distracted is actually one of the three common causes of car accidents — the other being DUI (driving under influence of alcohol or drugs) and speeding — and all drivers should avoid doing it. No one deserves to get injured or lose their life just because a driver couldn’t keep his eyes on the road.
If you are a victim of a vehicular accident, or you know someone who is, or you lost a loved one because of this, please don’t hesitate to ask for help. The police will always be there for you, but more than that, car accident attorneys are always willing to help you in protecting your rights and in getting you the justice that you deserve.
