Truck Wide-Turn & Squeeze Accident Claims

A truck swinging wide to make a right turn can trap a car, motorcycle, or cyclist in the gap on its right side.

It is called the right hook, and it is one of the most misunderstood truck crashes there is.

The insurer will tell you the smaller vehicle should not have been there.

The law usually sees it differently.

A truck driver who turns without accounting for the space their trailer sweeps through is the one at fault.

These cases are won by showing what the driver could see and should have done before turning.

Call (888) 713-6653 for a free case review. You pay nothing unless we win.

A long truck cannot turn like a car. To get the trailer around a corner, the driver swings the cab left first, then turns right, and the trailer's rear wheels cut across a tighter path than the cab, which is called off-tracking. To a driver behind or beside the truck, that initial swing to the left looks like the truck is changing lanes or going straight, not turning right.

The squeeze happens when the truck pins a vehicle that moved up on its right against the curb, a parked car, or the corner itself as the trailer comes around. Cyclists and motorcyclists are the most vulnerable, but cars get caught too. The driver is required to anticipate exactly this, to check mirrors, signal early, and not begin the turn until the right side is clear.

The trucking company's go-to argument is that you should not have been on the truck's right side. Sometimes that has partial force, but it rarely tells the whole story, and in many of these crashes the truck driver carries most or all of the fault.

The driver controls the turn. They are trained on off-tracking, they are required to check their mirrors, and they are responsible for not starting a turn that sweeps over an occupied space. A wide right turn made without confirming the right side is clear is negligent driving, full stop. Even where some shared fault exists, comparative negligence rules in most states still allow a substantial recovery. Understanding how fault is determined is central to beating this defense.

These cases turn on reconstructing the geometry of the turn and what the driver could see. The proof includes the truck's mirrors and sightlines, dashcam or intersection-camera footage, the positions and damage on both vehicles, and the driver's training records on safe turning. Pulled together, that evidence shows whether the driver checked the right side and started the turn anyway. Identifying every responsible party, the driver and the carrier, follows our overview of who can be sued in a truck accident.

Your filing deadline depends on your state's statute of limitations, and it varies. The intersection-camera footage that often decides these cases overwrites within days, and the truck's data cycles out within weeks. Moving quickly is what preserves the proof that beats the blame-the-victim defense. Get your specific deadline confirmed for your state and your facts.