Distracted Driving Causes Over 50,000 Florida Car Accidents Annually

August 28, 2019

According to recent statistics by the Florida Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, distracted driving can be visual, manual, or cognitive. Examples of distracted driving include texting, eating, checking your GPS, unsecured pets, adjusting the radio, tending to kids in the back seat, and even daydreaming. Government statistics show that there were 50,190 distracted driving crashes in Florida in 2017, 1,746 of which occurred in Palm Beach County.

Distracted driving can be the basis for a legal claim for damages against the distracted driver. Most claims arising out of Florida car crashes are the result of negligent conduct. To establish a Florida negligence claim, a plaintiff must prove: the defendant owed a duty of care to the plaintiff to conform to a certain standard of conduct; the defendant breached that duty; a causal connection existed between the defendant’s conduct and the plaintiff’s injuries.

Florida drivers are required to drive carefully and prudently to avoid endangering other people and property. This includes being attentive to the road at all times in order to be prepared for an emergency. In a motor vehicle claim, the plaintiff must show that the accident was a foreseeable result of the defendant’s actions. For example, causing a crash because a driver was distracted is a foreseeable result of failing to maintain attention to the road while driving.

Distracted Driver Kills Woman in Crash

According to a local news source, a distracted driver crashed her car into a group of cyclists on a recent Sunday morning in Davie, Florida. One woman was killed, and another cyclist was seriously injured. According to the local police department, the crash occurred around 8:30 a.m. when a woman driving a Honda Fit hit a group of about 14 bicyclists.

The driver drove up behind the group of cyclists, and said she did not see the cyclists before she hit them. She apparently “felt the impact and swerved off the road.” The victims were brought to a nearby hospital. The woman who died was 53 years old. Other cyclists were injured as well.

The driver, who was 33 years old, reportedly told police that she was distracted by something in her car. Police said that they were investigating the distraction and the fact that the sun was shining into the woman’s windshield as causes of the crash. A spokesman for the police department stressed the importance of staying attentive to the road, because “it only takes that one second of distraction for a fatal accident to occur.”