The construction industry is essential to Washington’s expanding infrastructure and a major employer within the state. Construction work on structures and roadways entails inherent risks, including hazards associated with working at heights, sharp tools, and heavy equipment. However, carefully adhering to safety protocols and ensuring adequate training and monitoring minimizes the risk of serious construction accidents in Marysville and elsewhere in Washington.
If you or a close family member has been injured in a construction accident, contact a Wells Trumbull Marysville personal injury attorney in Marysville for a free consultation to learn how you can recover compensation.
Why Choose Wells Trumbull as Your Marysville Construction Accident Law Firm?
Attorneys Ben Wells and Joshua Trumbull have dedicated their careers to advocating for injury victims, including against large construction companies and their powerful insurance providers. With Wells Trumbull on your side, your case has the following advantages:
- A personalized strategy by a law firm dedicated to advocating for injury victims
- An attorney who takes the time to get to know you and understand the full impact of your injury, to better convey the consequences of the injury to the insurance company
- Access to key resources, such as medical experts, to support your claim
- A law firm with a history of success in recovering millions of dollars for injured clients, including a recent $4.1 million recovery in a construction accident claim
We don’t charge up-front fees to injury victims. Instead, we offer a free confidential consultation and contingency-based payment, so you owe nothing until after we’ve recovered compensation for you through a settlement or court award for your damages.
How Construction Accidents Happen in Marysville
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) classifies construction as a “high-hazard” industry and imposes stringent safety protocols on construction site managers and workers. Still, construction accidents and injuries in Washington more than doubled between 2018 and 2022. The most common causes of construction accidents include the following:
- Slip-and-fall and trip-and-fall accidents
- Falls from heights
- Transportation accidents
- Heavy equipment accidents
- “Struck-by accidents,” including being struck by falling objects, moving equipment, or moving construction vehicles
- “Caught between” accidents
- Lifting accidents
- Electrocution
- Fires
- Explosions
- Scaffold collapses
- Sharp equipment injuries
- Toxic exposures
- Trench collapses
Defective tools, equipment, and machinery also contribute to the high number of construction accidents in Marysville and elsewhere in Washington.
What Types of Construction Accident Injuries Occur In Marysville?
Construction accident injuries are often painful and temporarily or permanently debilitating, causing financial hardship for the injury victim and their family. Common types of injuries in construction accidents in Marysville and elsewhere include the following:
- Back injuries
- Neck injuries
- Soft-tissue injuries to knees, shoulders, ankles, and wrists
- Fractures
- Traumatic brain injuries
- Lacerations, contusions, and abrasions
- Burns
- Traumatic amputations
- Electricution injuries
- Crush injuries
- Internal organ injuries
- Illness from toxic exposure
- Facial and dental injuries
Ensuring adequate training and carefully following safety procedures minimizes the risk of construction accidents. Unfortunately, construction site managers, contractors, and subcontractors sometimes cut corners, fail to implement proper training, or use poorly maintained equipment. In addition, sometimes property owners fail to adequately warn construction workers of hazards on their property.
What Should I Do After a Construction Accident?
Construction accidents are painful and traumatic. In some cases, an injury victim may be too badly injured to take purposeful action at the scene; however, preserving evidence can sometimes begin at the accident scene by using a cell phone or asking an uninjured person to use one for you. After an accident on a construction site, take the following actions:
- First, call 911 for severe or life-threatening injury, or arrange transportation to a hospital
- Then, apply emergency first aid
- While waiting, use a cell phone camera to snap photos of anything relevant to the injury, such as broken equipment, a collapsed scaffold, or a fallen object
- Take photos of any visible injuries
- Report the injury to an immediate supervisor and ask them to fill out an accident report
Always go directly to the hospital from the injury scene, as this not only ensures that you receive critical emergency care, but also provides evidence that the injury occurred at work.
At the hospital, ask for a detailed medical report listing your injuries, the doctor’s recommendations for your treatment, and your overall prognosis for the future.
Be sure to report your accident to your employer in writing as soon as possible. Follow your doctor’s treatment recommendations carefully until you reach the maximum medical improvement for your injury.
Understanding Liability In Marysville Construction Accident Cases
Almost all employers in Washington with one or more employees must carry workers’ compensation insurance as required by Washington’s State Department of Labor and Industries. Workers’ compensation not only pays for an injury victim’s medical expenses and a portion of their wages, but it also protects employers from direct liability for injuries. Depending on the circumstances of the injury, however, a construction accident victim could file a lawsuit against a third party, such as a negligent contractor, subcontractor, property owner, or driver. In other cases, the manufacturer of defective construction equipment or products could be liable for damages through a product liability claim. A third-party lawsuit may proceed alongside a workers’ compensation claim.
What Can I Recover In a Construction Accident Claim In Marysville?
Construction accident injuries are often expensive to treat, requiring medical procedures, surgeries, medications, and physical therapy, while also disrupting the ability to work. A successful claim doesn’t undo the injury, but it relieves the related financial consequences. Common damages recovered from third-party lawsuits include the following:
- Compensation for past and future medical expenses and out-of-pocket costs
- Lost earnings
- Future income loss and reduced earning ability
- Compensation for pain and suffering
- Compensation for catastrophic injuries, such as loss of limb, permanent scarring, disability, chronic pain, loss of consortium, or loss of enjoyment of life
- Wrongful death compensation for the family of a fatally injured construction worker
Third-party lawsuits allow injury victims to claim non-economic damages such as pain and suffering and catastrophic injury, whereas workers’ compensation only allows claims for economic damages.
Call or Contact Wells Trumbull Online About Your Construction Accident Case In Marysville
Construction accident claims are complex, requiring an investigation to pursue all available avenues of compensation under Washington’s pure comparative negligence laws, or laws of contributory fault. Insurance companies often dispute or undervalue claims to protect their profits at your expense. Instead of leaving your case in their hands, contact Wells Trumbull to learn more about your rights.