Defective Guardrail Accidents
The guardrail was supposed to protect you
A guardrail is designed to absorb a crash and keep you on the road. When one is defective, installed wrong or never repaired, it can spear through a car or send it into the very hazard it was meant to block. A defective guardrail accident lawyer can tell you whether you have a claim.
Most guardrail ends are built to flatten or slide back when a car hits them head-on, slowing the car down gradually instead of stopping it all at once. Along the side, the rail is meant to catch the car and guide it back toward the road. The Federal Highway Administration explains how guardrail end terminals are designed to work.
When a guardrail does its job, a crash that could have been fatal becomes one people walk away from. When it doesn’t, the guardrail itself can cause the worst of the injuries.
Five ways guardrails fail
The end goes through the car:
A rail end that doesn't collapse the way it should can push through the front or side of the vehicle and into the cabin.
It was installed wrong:
Wrong height, wrong spacing, or posts set too far apart to hold a car at highway speed.
The parts don’t match:
An end piece from one system bolted to a rail from another, or repairs made with whatever parts were on the truck.
It was damaged and never repaired:
A rail bent or loosened in an earlier crash may not hold in the next one.
The road changed around it:
Repaving can raise the road surface until a rail that was the right height is too low to catch a car.
Damaged guardrails are often repaired or replaced within days of a crash. Photographs taken early may be the only record of how the guardrail actually failed.
WHO IS RESPONSIBLE
More than one party may be responsible.
A guardrail crash rarely has a single cause, and it rarely has a single responsible party.
Like other personal injury claims, the first job is working out who is responsible.
A claim can involve the company that made the guardrail, the contractor that installed or repaired it, and the government agency responsible for that road. If another driver or a commercial truck forced you off the road, they may be responsible too. Each is a separate claim with its own rules and deadlines.
When the road belongs to the state, a county or a city
Claims against a government agency in Oklahoma require written notice within a much shorter deadline than most injury claims, and there are limits on what can be recovered. If the notice is late, the claim can be lost entirely, no matter how strong it is.
When the guardrail itself was defective
If the guardrail was poorly designed or made, the manufacturer may be responsible even if the crash was partly your fault. The question is whether the guardrail made your injuries worse than they would have been if it had worked as intended.
At the scene and after
What helps, in the order it helps
At the scene
Photograph the guardrail
Call the police and get a report number. Photograph the guardrail, its end and the posts from several angles. Damaged rails are often repaired within days.
Same day
Get checked out
Adrenaline hides injuries, and a gap between the crash and your first medical visit is the first thing an insurer will point to. See a doctor the same day, even if you feel fine.
First week
Keep the vehicle
Don’t let an insurer scrap or sell your car before an attorney has seen it. The damage to the vehicle shows how the guardrail behaved, and it’s often the most important evidence in the case.
BEFORE ANY DEADLINE
Call before the deadline
If a government agency maintains the road, the notice deadline may be months away, not years. A short call now protects every claim you have, including the ones you don’t know yet.
Common questions
Guardrail accident claims, answered.
Clear answers are part of the work. If your question is not here, ask it directly. The consultation is free.
I hit the guardrail myself. Can I still have a claim?
Possibly. If the guardrail was defective or installed wrong and made your injuries worse, you may have a claim even if the crash was partly your fault. Under Oklahoma law you can generally still recover if you were not more than 50% at fault, though your recovery is reduced by your share.
Who is liable if you hit a guardrail?
It depends on why the guardrail failed. The manufacturer, the contractor that installed or repaired it, the agency that maintains the road, or another driver can each be responsible, and often more than one is.
How long do I have to file?
Most Oklahoma injury claims have a two-year deadline, but claims against a government agency need written notice much sooner. Call us early so no deadline is missed.
The guardrail has already been repaired. Is it too late?
Not necessarily. Repair and maintenance records, crash reports, photos and your vehicle can still show what happened. Records get harder to find over time, so it helps to start early.
I was driving for work when it happened.
Then you likely have a workers’compensation claim and may also have a claim against whoever is responsible for the guardrail. → How the two claims work
