Accident Reconstruction and the Importance of Physical Evidence

• Overview
• Credits

Understand how to obtain and preserve data after a crash and what should be done with this data regarding the law.Many attorneys, transportation officials, and insurance companies allow data to be inadvertently destroyed by not collecting and preserving data from event recording devices after a collision. This can lead to sanctions for spoliation of data due to the fact that it was not collected or not collected properly. Not collecting readily available data can lead to large losses. This topic will assist individuals in learning how to preserve this data and the processes involved.

Authors

Agenda

Motor Vehicle Event Recording Devices

• What Is an EDR?

• What Does It Do?

• What Is Recorded?

What Wakes up the System?

• Sudden Deceleration

• Narrow Object

• Types of Events Recorded

Interpretation of Data Recovered

• Is the Event From This Crash?

• Which Direction Is the Impact Coming From

• Low Speed Impact and Delta V

What Is an Electronic Control Module?

• Central Nervous System for a Heavy Truck

• Controls All Functions of Engine

• How Does It Work?

What Gets Recorded?

• Depends on the Engine Type

• Trigger Point Not Impact

• Default for Most Engines 7 Mph in One Second

Which Engines Provide Data?

• Detroit

• Mercedes

• Caterpillar

• Cummins

• Mack (Proprietary)

• Volvo (Proprietary)

Why Download

• Assist in Reconstruction

• Never Intended as a Replacement

• Spoliation

• Thorough Investigation