After our horrific truck crash on May 4, 2013, I learned about truck rear underride guards; I had not heard of them before. Since that time, I have learned many more things about deadly underride and how to prevent it.

Becoming educated about underride was not a direction I had planned on going with my life and time. But I have gained a great deal of knowledge related to the fact that AnnaLeah’s and Mary’s deaths (and Roya’s, too, along with countless other individual loved ones) might have been prevented had adequate underride protection been on the truck, into which our sturdy Crown Vic crashed — along with the fact that many more countless, unknown individuals will die unless this country takes decisive action.

This information, along with my unresolved grief due to the frustration of knowing that years have gone by without effective protection, fuels my efforts to work collaboratively to bring about widespread and significant change. It is now my aim to equip everyone with the same information — without the accompanying unwanted grief.

In the coming days, I will be emailing pieces of information — one at a time (see chart below) — about truck underride to Congress and trucking industry associations. I will also be posting it. Some of it you may already know; some of it may be new to you.

As I have stated before, it is my hope that, now that we have become aware of the tragic but preventable truck underride problem, we will work together swiftly to take decisive action to make sure that trucks are equipped with effective equipment to protect vulnerable road users –pedestrians, bicyclists, and passenger vehicles — from going under the trucks.

My vision is that people will be able to someday drive the roads of this country no longer fearful of riding under a truck, should we be so unfortunate as to collide with one, because they will all be equipped with the best possible underride protection.

Truck Underride 101: Discussion Topics