Blog Post

8 Dead as Vehicles Plunge into Canal After Central Valley Car Accident


July 16, 2008
Topic: Auto Accidents

The bodies of five farm laborers who are believed to have drowned after a two-car accident at the Delta-Mendota Canal as they returned from work, have been recovered, and another two are still missing.

The farm laborers were on their way back from picking peaches in a red SUV along the canal, while a commercial vehicle used for septic tank maintenance was driving westward on the same route. The speed of the two vehicles has not been determined. When the car accident occurred on the small bridge over the canal, both vehicles smashed through the barricades, and into the deep water. At the time of the car accident, experts have ascertained that the water was about 17 feet deep, and the currents were very strong. In other words, a survival was a distant hope.

So far, police investigations have revealed no details about the cause of the accident. All that remains at the scene of the car accident are skid marks of one of the vehicles as it went over the guardrail. The farm laborers are all immigrants, and most were in their teens or early twenties. As soon as news of the car accident spread, relatives of the immigrants began gathering at the scene, and Spanish language translators helped relay information to worried relatives. Disaster crews that reached the scene of the car accident say that it was obvious that there was not going to be any rescue in this particular tragedy, only recovery of bodies.

People in the neighborhood say the canal has been a death magnet for a while now, and it’s common to have accidents similar to this one, happening at least two or three times a year. Just three years ago, a similar car accident – this one too involving farm laborers - occurred, that killed four farm laborers who drowned when their vehicle went off the road and into the canal. Residents in the neighborhood also complain that the guardrail is of substandard quality, with light spacing. Obviously, the guardrail doesn’t seem to have been much of a ”barricade” to the two vehicles’ tragic fall down into the canal.

We need to take these claims of substandard guardrails at the bridge seriously, and look into whether there was indeed any negligence on the part of those responsible for the bridge’s or guardrail’s upkeep that could have resulted in this being an unreasonably dangerous highway.

Very often, laborers have very few people in their corner ready to fight on their side, with the result that a number of injustices go undetected and unpunished. These are hard working people who come here to do all the jobs we’re not interested in doing.

The Reeves Law Group is a law firm with offices throughout California dedicated exclusively to the representation of personal injury victims, including victims of car accidents. Please visit our website at trlglaw.com. If you desire a free consultation on a personal injury matter, please call us at (800) 644-8000 or email us.

 


The California personal injury attorneys at The Reeves Law Group represent victims of accidents, injuries and wrongful death throughout California from our offices in Los Angeles County, Orange County, San Diego County, Riverside County, San Bernardino County, Ventura County, Fresno County, Kern County, Sacramento County, San Fernando Valley, Long Beach, Antelope Valley, Torrance, Glendale, Bakersfield, Santa Ana, San Jose, San Francisco, Oakland, Ontario, and Victorville.