A truck accident caused by jackknifing is often catastrophic and can involve many other vehicles. In most driving situations, they’re avoidable provided the truck driver is skilled, understands their causes, and actively avoids them. Here are four of their causes: Light Trailer Loads Hauling a lightly loaded trailer doesn’t by itself cause jackknifing, but it makes the tractor-trailer combination more susceptible to the problem. Tire traction with the road requires weight pressing down on the wheel. The more weight in the trailer, the greater the tire traction. The tires of.
A jackknife truck accident occurs when a tractor-trailer brakes too hard on a slippery road. This can happen in one of two ways. When the trailer wheels lock up, the trailer wants to continue sliding down the road past the tractor. This causes the back of the trailer to fishtail about the trailer hitch. Meanwhile, the tractor is braking without skidding. If the truck driver fails to recover from this, the back of the trailer will continue to fishtail forward while pivoting on the hitch until it forms the classic.