Modern tractor-trailers are designed to carry tens of thousands of pounds of cargo safely and securely across hundreds of miles or further, so it may be hard to imagine a vehicle like that possibly being overloaded. However, like any other machine, tractor-trailers have maximum weight limits determined by both state and federal law. Drivers and trucking companies that knowingly overstep the limits put everyone on public roads at risk of catastrophic harm.
That said, filing a civil suit over an overloaded/overweight truck accident in Gilbert may be much trickier in practice than many people expect, partly because of how hard it can be to determine the truck’s exact pre-accident weight. Fortunately, you have support available from the seasoned truck injury attorneys at Phillips Law Group, who are all willing to progress your case to trial if that is what it takes to secure you fair compensation.
Under federal law, tractor-trailers on interstate highways or crossing state lines cannot have a gross vehicle weight rating—a total weight across the cargo, cab, and trailer combined—in excess of 80,000 pounds. Furthermore, assuming that the truck’s gross vehicle weight rating is spread evenly across all axles and axle groups, no truck is permitted to carry more than 20,000 pounds of weight on a single axle or more than 34,000 pounds on one tandem axle group.
Since Arizona imposes broadly identical rules on in-state traffic, the first step to successfully filing suit over an overweight truck wreck in Gilbert is proving that the truck involved was in violation of these specific weight limits or that an oversized load was being carried within state lines without the proper permits. Then, in order to recover compensation for those damages, the injured party would need to show that the damages for which they are seeking compensation all stemmed directly from a collision caused by that overweight truck.
Most of the time, the person primarily at fault for a traffic accident involving a commercial truck is someone directly involved in the accident. However, when it comes to claims involving overloaded and overweight truck crashes in Gilbert, civil liability for injuries often lies with the owner of the truck or the employer of the truck driver, being that individual truck drivers often do not have a great deal of authority over what type of cargo they are carrying and how much it weighs.
Even if a wreck involving an overweight truck can be traced mostly back to the truck operator’s negligent driving, the driver’s employer may still be vicariously liable, or responsible for the misconduct of its employee. Guidance from a seasoned truck accident attorney can be key to determining liability and ensuring that everyone who contributed to the wreck is held financially accountable for their actions.
A fully loaded tractor-trailer is virtually always the biggest and heaviest vehicle on any road it travels, which makes it uniquely difficult to operate even with extensive training and hands-on experience. Nevertheless, some trucking companies inadvertently or even intentionally disregard state and federal laws designed to keep people safe by overloading their trucks with more weight than is safe to carry.
If this kind of misconduct has directly led to you suffering serious injuries, you should strongly consider seeking help from a truck injury lawyer with Phillips Law Group, who has experience handling overloaded/overweight truck accidents in Gilbert. Call today for a free, no-obligation consultation.
(602) 222-2222 
