South Florida Injury Lawyers Blog
All terrain vehicles are considered a welcome past-time in Florida, especially now that cooler evenings have afforded more comfortable camping conditions in rural parts of the state. However, recent news reports are littered with stories of individuals who have lost their lives in Florida ATV accidents.
There was the teenager killed in Miami-Dade ATV crash late last month when the off-road vehicle was reportedly traveling on 198th Street and was struck by a pickup truck. Another teenager and the driver of the pickup were critically injured. Then there was the 41-year-old man who died in Ocala after the ATV he was riding crashed as he negotiated a curve on Southwest 153rd Loop. Then a 51-year-old Pompano Beach man was killed in an ATV accident at River Ranch Hunt Club in Lake Wales after reportedly losing control on a soft sand surface while trying to negotiate a right curve, resulting in a complete rollover, with the ATV resting on top of decedent.
Florida has some of the highest rates of ATV deaths in the U.S., according to the Consumer Product Safety Commission. The Sunshine State ranked No. 6 nationally, with 512 total deaths on ATVs reported between 1982 and 2012. A more recent CPSC analysis of ATV-related fatalities in 2016 indicates there were 337 reports of ATV deaths nationally just in 2016 alone. That’s a drop from the 484 reported in 2015 and the 581 reported in 2014. It should be noted that reporting for the last few most recent years is still ongoing, and these figures are expected to rise once the final reports are in. Between 1982 and 2016, the number of ATV deaths had risen to nearly 14,700. Continue reading →