Monthly Archives: September 2025

In Memory of Suleiman Hamideh (September 15, 2025)

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, Underride Crash Map, , , , , ,

 A young boy was hit and killed by a semi-truck Monday night while riding his bike off Cottondale Drive. 

The Baton Rouge Police Department said that the 7-year-old was hit around 7:40 p.m. on Lindale Avenue near the intersection of Cottondale. The coroner’s office later identified the boy as Suleiman Hamideh. . .

. . . he struck Hamideh with the rear driver’s side tire on his trailer. . . 7-year-old boy fatally struck by 18-wheeler while riding bike in Baton Rouge

Suleiman Hamideh, Precious One Gone Too Soon

Because the bottom of a truck is higher than the bumper of passenger vehicles, when there is a collision the smaller vehicle easily slides under the truck and the first point of impact is the windshield. Seatbelts, airbags, and car crumple zones do not function as intended in underride crashes —front, side, and rear — leaving passenger vehicle occupants vulnerable to life-threatening injuries. This is also true for Vulnerable Road Users, such as pedestrians, bicyclists, motorcyclists and wheelchair users, who can suffer catastrophic injuries when they collide with the unguarded side of a large truck.

Note: In order to raise awareness and preserve the memories of underride victims — precious ones gone too soon — I have been writing memorial posts on what could potentially be underride crashes. I am not a crash reconstructionist, and I do not have all the facts on these crashes; but underride should be investigated as a potential factor in truck crash injuries and deaths. See Underride Crash Memorials posted here and at #STOPunderrides Tweets. To add photos or more information on this story or to add other underride crashes to be remembered, send an email to underridemap@gmail.com.

Find out more about Vulnerable Road Users and preventable underride tragedies:

In Memory of Colene Ruhl (September 16, 2025)

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, Underride Crash Map, , , , , , , ,

A woman in a motorized wheelchair was hit and killed Tuesday afternoon in Winter Springs, a spokesperson for the city told WESH 2. . .

Officials said they found the woman lying in the roadway, “deceased from what appeared to be injuries suffered from being struck by a semi-tractor-trailer.”

The woman was on the sidewalk when a semi heading east on SR-434 was attempting to make a right turn on Belle Avenue.

As the semi began to turn right onto Belle, the woman started to cross Belle and was hit by the trailer of the turning semi, thrown from the wheelchair and killed, officials said. Woman thrown from wheelchair, killed after being hit by semi making turn in Winter Springs

Colene Ruhl, Precious One Gone Too Soon

Because the bottom of a truck is higher than the bumper of passenger vehicles, when there is a collision the smaller vehicle easily slides under the truck and the first point of impact is the windshield. Seatbelts, airbags, and car crumple zones do not function as intended in underride crashes —front, side, and rear — leaving passenger vehicle occupants vulnerable to life-threatening injuries. This is also true for Vulnerable Road Users, such as pedestrians, bicyclists, motorcyclists and wheelchair users, who can suffer catastrophic injuries when they collide with the unguarded side of a large truck.

Note: In order to raise awareness and preserve the memories of underride victims — precious ones gone too soon — I have been writing memorial posts on what could potentially be underride crashes. I am not a crash reconstructionist, and I do not have all the facts on these crashes; but underride should be investigated as a potential factor in truck crash injuries and deaths. See Underride Crash Memorials posted here and at #STOPunderrides Tweets. To add photos or more information on this story or to add other underride crashes to be remembered, send an email to underridemap@gmail.com.

Find out more about Vulnerable Road Users and preventable underride tragedies:

Critique of NHTSA-Contracted Elemance Rear Impact Guard Research

Safety Advocacy, Truck Safety, , , , , , , , , ,

Secretary Duffy,

The Department of Transportation (DOT) engaged Elemance LLC in 2022 to evaluate three current designs of rear impact guards. Unfortunately, Elemance conducted Finite Element analysis of two obsolete rear underride guards that were not current designs at the time of the contract. In fact, both of those designs had been proven a decade earlier to be crash-deficient. The two manufacturers — Great Dane and Wabash — have developed designs with safer, stronger rear-guard designs. Elemance compounded that error by employing an erroneous definition of Passenger Compartment Intrusion. Elemance’s research findings, Heavy-Truck Rear-Impact-Guard Finite Element Simulation and Analysis, are flawed and backwards-looking rather than helpful to the Department and Congress in evaluating current and future rear underride guard performance and regulatory standards.

Please find attached a detailed critique by engineers who are well-acquainted with the underride problem and solutions. This is what the engineers concluded about the NHTSA-contracted research:

In view of the defects in the Elemance report, a follow up study should be commissioned to evaluate examples of current state of the art rear impact guards that have been in service since 2016 and 2017 respectively. The study should utilize the correct definition of PCI and more accurately assess injury risk.

The Department should act promptly to address the flaws in this federal research in order to fulfill its mission to reduce roadway injuries and deaths.

Jerry and Marianne Karth

Note: This critique was submitted as a Public Comment on September 3, 2025, to the U.S. Department of Transportation in response to their Request for Comments on priorities for the 2026 Surface Transportation Reauthorization.

This video created by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety twelve years ago explains their Rear Impact Guard crash testing research and how the federal standard is failing to protect road users:

This video is a compilation of IIHS Rear Impact Guard crash tests with old and new guard designs for many of the major trailer manufacturers:

This video demonstrates the night & day difference between old and new designs by one manufacturer: