Events resulting in severe injuries or death are often the subject of accident reconstruction. This activity relies upon experts who comb the scene of a collision, fire, explosion or other thing or place where damage to persons or property occur.
While there are many different types of accident reconstructionists, perhaps the most common are those involving truck and automotive collisions.
Major trucking companies today have automated communications systems that trigger alarms in corporate headquarters which result in the immediate dispatching of investigative teams to the scene of serious collisions. The goal is to identify, preserve and control evidence at the scene. This can mean people, places or things.
An example helps illustrate how this works. Vehicular accident reconstruction is the scientific process of investigating, analyzing, and drawing conclusions about the causes and events during a vehicle collision. Reconstructionist are employed to conduct in-depth collision analysis and reconstruction to identify the collision causation and contributing factors in different types of collisions, including:
- role of the driver(s);
- vehicle(s);
- roadway; and
- environment (lighting, rain / snow / sleet / hail, traffic, restricted vision).
The laws of physics and engineering principles such as the conservation of linear momentum, work-energy methods, and kinematics are the basis for these analyses and may make use of software to calculate useful quantities. Accident reconstruction provides rigorous scientific analysis that an expert witness can present at trial. Accident reconstructions are done in cases involving fatalities, and often when personal injury is involved. Forensic engineers, specialized units in law enforcement agencies, or private consultants often conduct these reconstructions.
It is important to know where to find a competent Reconstructionist for the specific matter at hand, whether it is for a motorcycle, car, bus or 18-wheeler collision, equipment failure, fire or explosion. This work requires prompt action on the part of the injured party, or his survivors, their lawyer and his response team.