In most accidents involving bad weather, the driving conditions in themselves were not the cause of the accident. Rather, the drivers’ failure to take the weather into account is the more common culprit, as any good car accident injury attorney knows. Inclement weather usually results in, among other things, poor visibility and slippery roads. First, the issue of visibility: the question is not whether we can see, but how much. The less we are able to see, the quicker our reaction time needs to be. Even on a clear night, for example, our visibility is diminished—our headlights cannot follow the curves of the road. What we can see is limited to the angle and range of the beams, giving us visual access to far less of our environment than we get during the day. And it goes without saying that rain, snow and fog significantly limit visibility.

Next, the question of driving surface. A slippery road means uncertain breaks and maneuverability, a dependable recipe for a crash. Contrary to what most people assume, rain and snow are often the most dangerous just after they begin to fall—the oil and dust that has not yet been washed away combines with water to form a slick layer on the road.

Of course, the best thing is to avoid driving in bad weather, but we know from experience that it not always possible to do so. If you have to drive come rain, sleet or snow—or, for that matter, fog or dark of night—drive cautiously and take the appropriate measures. Respecting the weather also means driving far below the speed limit on occasion.

In the snow, defrost your windshield before driving, put chains on your tires, and slow way down. In the rain, check your windshield wipers, defrost your windshield and, again, reduce your speed. According to the California Driver Handbook, “in a heavy rainstorm or snowstorm, you may not be able to see more than 100 feet ahead, and when you can’t see any farther than that, you cannot safely drive faster than 30 mph.” In fog, many drivers make the mistake of turning on their high beams in the hopes that they’ll be able to see better. In actuality, the intense light of one’s high beams reflects off the water droplets in the air, bouncing back into the driver’s eyes, further obscuring the scene around them. If you have to drive in bad fog, use your low beams and—you guessed it—slow way down.

A set minimum amount of liability insurance is required by California law, and in many other states. The important question is whether merely buying the minimum amount is enough. A good attorney for car accidents will tell you the answer—absolutely not! California’s legally required bodily injury insurance limits of $15,000 (one claimant) and $30,000 (all claimants) are woefully inadequate to protect your financial assets or pay for the possible medical expenses of an injured party. These limits have gone unchanged for the past 30 years, while medical costs have grown exponentially.

Let’s say…

You run a stop sign and crash into another car. The driver is taken to the hospital for surgery where she stays for over a month. She undergoes rehabilitation and physical therapy, and is unable to work for two years. Even if the driver earns less than $50,000 a year, the total claim could easily hit $1,000,000. Now compare this to the $15,000 of liability insurance required by law.

This scenario may sound extreme, but it’s not. The above scenario, in fact, is a moderate one—the other driver survived and had no permanent disability. When imagining a car accident, the majority of people envision the kinds of minor fender benders that many of us have experienced and walked away from unscathed: no serious injuries, only mild damage to the vehicles—nothing that would entail hospital bills or lost wages. The reality, however, is often a great deal more severe.

The precise amount of liability insurance you should buy depends largely upon the extent of your assets. Those with extensive wealth are far more likely to be sued for large sums of money. Understanding car insurance means not only peering into the minds of insurance adjusters, but lawyers as well. Personal injury attorneys are far more likely to go after the assets of high net worth individuals, providing them with a greater payoff if they win on behalf of their client, rather than simply advising their clients to settle for the limit of the other driver’s insurance policy.

It is easy to see that the result could be financially catastrophic such an individual. But this result could be avoided with an adequate liability insurance policy. You may have heard that you should buy a liability policy with a limit that more or less equals your total assets, the idea being that you are “covering” your assets in doing so. If your insurance equals or exceeds your net worth, so the thinking goes, you’ll never have to worry about having to pay a lawsuit judgment out of your own pocket. This is nonsense, and it’s based on a complete misunderstanding of how insurance and personal injury law work. There’s nothing that says that someone couldn’t sue you for more than your policy limit, requiring you to pay the difference. Your liability insurance is the first line of defense, and a good one at that, but your personal assets remain vulnerable beyond your policy limits.

There is no secret formula to tell you how much liability coverage is enough, but there is a sound principle that can help you make an informed decision. And the principle is this: within reason, and within the confines of your budget, you want the highest possible ratio between your policy limit and your total assets. The smaller your assets look in comparison to your liability coverage, the more likely an attorney would advise her client to settle for your policy limit, leaving your personal assets untouched.

Everything we do, think, and feel is made possible by the workings of our brain: our perception, cognition, movement—everything. Most fundamentally, our brain provides the seat of our personality and our sense of self. It gives form to the person we are and, for children, the person they might become. That’s why a child’s traumatic brain injury (TBI), one of several common auto accident injuries,  is a parent’s worst nightmare. Although the parent’s son or daughter physically survives an accident, the child is in some significant way not the same.

Such a child faces an uncertain rehabilitation process. Improvements will be made, parents are told, but it is unlikely that their child will return to the level of functioning before the injury. Changes will persist in how he or she navigates the world. The child may struggle to learn, to speak or to control his or her impulses, for example. Once parents learn this, they must somehow cope with the loss of the image they held of their child, and to form a new one that reflects the realities of their child’s injuries.

Because I believe traumatic brain injury in children—typically occurring in accidents involving cars—represents such an important subject, I’d like to cover the basics of how brain injury can occur in children. I’m certainly not a neurologist, but over the course of my career as a personal injury attorney, I’ve learned that there are a few principal ways in which the child’s brain can suffer trauma as a result of an auto accident.

There are two basic scenarios that lead to brain injury. The first is when the child’s head is relatively stationary and is hit by a moving object—a child runs out into the street and is struck by a car, for example. The second is when a child’s head and body are moving—as they are when the child is riding in the car—and abruptly stops upon contact with a stationary object—the dashboard, for example. In both of these scenarios, a great deal of physical force and energy is abruptly transferred to the child’s head and brain.

Upon contact with the object, the child’s brain—which sits inside the skull, surrounded by a layer of protective fluid—will move violently, probably striking the inner wall of the skull. This contact typically leads to the brain being bruised, resulting in “contusions,” as they are called. These contusions will certainly occur in the region of the brain nearest to the point where the child’s head contacted the object. They may also occur, however, on the opposite side of the brain, especially in accidents where the child is moving. Imagine it: upon contact, the child’s head suddenly stops, but the brain continues moving—first forward, striking the skull, and then backwards, only to strike it again.

Contusions represent injuries to the outer layer of the brain, known as the “cortex” or “grey matter,” composed of the tips of the brain cells. As a result of the violent movement I just described, injury can also occur to the inside of the brain—the “white matter,” which is made up of the long wire-like extensions of the brain cells: the “axons.” That’s why this type of damage is known as “diffuse axonal injury.” Injury to the inner part of the brain is especially likely when the accident causes the brain to twist, stretching and breaking these long axons, killing the cells of which they are a part.

Contusions and diffuse axonal injury represent the most immediate trauma that can be caused by an auto accident. Further injury can also occur as the result of complications from this damage. Delayed injuries can occur if bleeding inside the head creates excessive pressure, which can prevent adequate blood flow to the brain. Increased pressure can also build if there is “edema,” or swelling of the brain. Immediate medical treatment following the accident is the best way to prevent this type of secondary damage.

I hope this article has given you a basic understanding of the basic physical mechanisms that underlie brain injury. TBI in children is—I’m sorry to say—a common result of auto-related accidents. Fortunately, there is a great deal that can be done to prevent these injuries, and with proper medical care, rehabilitation and legal representation, injured children can make astounding recoveries. These recoveries may take time, but they are a testament to the devotion of loved ones, the skill of medical professionals, the expertise of qualified attorneys and—finally—the adaptability and plasticity of our amazing brains.

If you have recently been in an accident, reporting the incident—both to the right parties and within an adequate time frame—is of the utmost importance for auto accident claims. Properly reporting your accident not only lays the foundation for your claim, but can save you from a number of damaging consequences that can follow an unreported collision.

Nonetheless, I’ve found that many of the people who contact me for a consultation don’t know who they need to call, how long they have to make those calls and how to report their accident in a way that will ultimately improve their chances of receiving an adequate settlement. In this article, I want to tell you what I tell all my prospective clients about reporting an accident.

Who and when to call:

The Police

If a police officer came to the scene of your accident, then it’s not necessary for you to file a police report. The officer has already done so. However, if neither you nor the injured driver called the police at the time of the accident, doing so may not only be a good idea in terms of your legal claim, but may also be mandated by law.

As I’ve alluded to, there are two reasons to file a police report following an auto accident. Though a great many people don’t know this, the first is that you are legally required to report the accident to the police if the incident meets certain conditions. State law requires a police report if anyone was injured or if the property damage from the accident exceeds a certain monetary threshold.

Second, filing a police report allows you to create an official record of the incident from your perspective. The police report is a critical document in personal injury cases. Questions about who was at fault and the extent of your injuries may ultimately be answered by this account of what happened. If, for example, the report indicated that you were able to walk under your own power after the accident, the insurance company may use this to challenge your claim for compensation to pay for medical bills. (Of course, this challenge is made out of a willful denial of the fact that many injuries don’t become symptomatic until some time has passed.) That’s why I tell prospective clients not to pass up on this precious opportunity to turn their version of the accident into an official record.

The DMV

State law may also require that you contact the Department of Motor Vehicles following an accident. In California for example, one of states in which I practice law, you must contact the DMV if the accident met one or both of the following conditions: if property damage as a result of the collision exceeded $750 in value, or if anyone was injured, no matter how slightly. The law of your state may provide only a short window of time in which to submit the proper forms to the DMV. California drivers have only 10 days.

What if you fail to report the accident or if you wait too long to do so? Unfortunately, you may face a suspended driver’s license. And ignorance is no defense, trust me. I’ve talked to drivers whose licenses have been suspended because they weren’t aware of this legal obligation.

Your Insurance Company

An auto insurance policy is basically a contract in which both you and your insurance carrier agree to take certain actions in the event of an incident that falls under the terms of the contract. By purchasing this policy, you are agreeing to promptly report any auto accident you experience while you are covered. What’s more, your policy may dictate that you have only a very short time in which to notify them of the incident.

Though you clearly must contact your insurance company, an important note of caution is needed here. Unlike the police and the DMV, your insurance company has a vested interest in the outcome of your case. The problem is that it may not be clear at first whether this interest runs for or against you. In many cases, your insurance company will be on your side, hoping to hold the other driver’s insurance carrier financially accountable for whatever damage resulted or injuries you sustained. However, this isn’t always the case.

When talking to prospective clients, I will offer this rule of thumb: be very careful when speaking to someone whose job it might be to undermine your claim before it even starts. A representative from the other driver’s insurance company certainly fits this description. However, a friendly voice from your own insurance company may also turn out to have been coming from just such a person.

I hope you have found this information of value, and that it underscores the benefit of a free consultation with an experienced personal injury attorney.

Keeping your child safe in the car is not only about safe driving. Even the most cautious driver can get into an accident through no fault of his or her own. The second part of safety in the car is proper seating, which can prevent injury from car accident. Let’s go over a few general safety principles regarding child seating.

• Two passengers should never share a seatbelt. Only one seat belt per person. Sharing seatbelts ensures that neither person is positioned correctly and is liable to cause injuries to both should an accident occur.
• A child should never be held on the lap of an adult. The force of an accident could crush the child or send the child out of the adult’s arms.
• A child should never just wear a lap belt. It exposes his or her abdomen to serious injury in the event of a crash.
• Children should always sit in the back seat if the car is equipped with a passenger-side airbag.
• If the child does use a seatbelt, it should always fit properly. We’ll discuss this in more detail later.
• Adults riding with children should always wear seatbelts themselves. After all, kids learn many lifelong habits, good and bad, from copying their parents and other adults in their lives.

For more on child safety in cars, check out the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration website.