ORLANDO, Fla. — The gorgeous lady behind your truck is passing you by and making signs for you to stop. You begin to feel flattered and even when you didn’t feel so handsome today, she insists that you need to stop. Now you stop — and what happens? 

Surprise, surprise — your truck’s top was not well secured and is throwing debris all across the highway. A piece of debris fell onto her windshield and caused a chip which may eventually crack.

According to the Bureau of Motor Carrier Compliance in Tallahassee, FL —A vehicle may not be driven or moved on any highway unless the vehicle is so constructed or loaded as to prevent any of its load from dropping, shifting, leaking, blowing, or otherwise escaping therefrom, except that sand may be dropped only for the purpose of securing traction or water or other substance may be sprinkled on a roadway in cleaning or maintaining the roadway.

In other words, you are liable for the damages produced by your truck’s debris to other vehicles as you drive.

It is the duty of every owner and driver of any vehicle hauling any material that could fall or blow from such vehicle, to prevent such materials from falling, blowing, or in any way escaping from such vehicle.

Well this is all considering that your flying objects did not, in the process, hit and injured a person directly.  Any person whose willful offense results in serious bodily injury or death to an individual, commits a criminal traffic offense and a misdemeanor of the second degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082 or s. 775.083.

In this particular case, a South Florida man was seriously injured by flying debris on I-95, a driver was seriously injured when a piece of flying debris struck his car's windshield while he was driving on Interstate 95. "Somebody saw the truck from which this part became dislodged," one of his attorneys said.

Debris could come from cars and trucks who have dropped things from the vehicles, also from the vehicles themselves after an accident. Even very small pieces of debris can become dangerous when it is thrown at high speeds.

Vehicle-related road debris (VRRD) crashes are crashes in which a ve- hicle strikes or is struck by VRRD, and crashes in which a vehicle successfully maneuvers to avoid VRRD but the avoidance maneuver results in a crash. The many possible configurations of VRRD crashes are listed in Figure 3. 

A study from the AAA estimates that VRRD causes over 25,000 crashes per year and claims 81 to 90 lives per year in North America.

We hope to have given you enough reasons to understand the importance of having an appropriate coverage for the many unexpected circumstances you may find in the road on a day-to-day basis.

Obviously, our State’s Department of Transportation will do their part enforcing these rules to promote safety on the road, but you must do your part making sure you have taken all the steps needed to prevent your cargo to cause these kinds of inconvenience.  

You are better served when you have an insurance coverage that may respond to all liabilities you and your business may be subject to. It really makes you look good as a person, as a business owner and a responsible citizen.