1. Inadequate insurance on Georgia log trucks.

Georgia law requires only $100,000 liability insurance for 18-wheeler log trucks with tree-length timber that operate only within Georgia’s state lines. This is grossly inadequate for catastrophic injury and wrongful death cases. Through decades of experience, we have found ways to locate other insurance coverages and multiply the potential recovery. In a recent log truck case in rural Georgia, we recovered sixteen times the truck’s insurance policy limit—$1.6 million—although the coverage on the truck was only $100,000.

2. Visual confusion of overlength loads in Georgia log truck accidents.

Drivers approaching an overlength log load from the rear confront a lot of visual confusion as the load extends far beyond the end of the trailer. Often, the end of a load of logs bounces around, almost dragging on the pavement and obscuring the taillights of the trailer. The fancy word for this is “conspicuity.” This is especially dangerous in twilight or dark, too often causing impalement or beheading of an innocent person in a following vehicle.  We have had numerous cases where a load of logs extending twenty feet or more behind a trailer impaled the vehicle of an innocent driver.

3. Log load swing out on turns.

Another hazard is when an extended load of logs swings out in a turn. We had a case in which a log truck driver in predawn darkness was making a U-turn on a divided four-lane highway. The extended load of logs formed a black fence in the dark across a traffic lane. The grisly results of such accidents are all too predictable.

4. Inadequate Georgia log trucking safety rules.

Log trucks operating solely within the state lines of Georgia are subject to the Georgia Forest Products Trucking Rules, not the stricter Federal Motor Carrier Safety Rules. These state rules were written by representatives of the logging industry in a way to avoid citations and prosecutions for unsafe practices. There is no specific rule on one of the greatest hazards, tree-length logs hanging twenty feet or more off the end of a trailer on highways. Through long experience, we have found ways to layer the federal rules and other industry materials with expert testimony from retired loggers with many years of experience to support a standard of safety that is more reasonable than the minimal, lax state regulations.

5. Weak enforcement of Georgia’s weak log truck safety rules.

Georgia law requires both a red flag and a red light on the extreme end of the load must be plainly visible from 500 feet to the rear and sides. While some sort of light is usually hung at the end of the load, it is rarely visible more than about fifty 50 feet behind the truck on the highway. Often when following log trucks, you may see the required light is weak, flickering, with a loose bulb, poor wiring, and poorly maintained. The red flags are often extremely dirty, stained, and barely visible.

The same is true about side reflectors, which are required on log trailers to make them visible to drivers approaching from the side at night. The reflectors are often thickly covered with mud, damaged, or missing. With few trucking safety enforcement officers spread thin across the state, enforcement is rare.

6.  Inadequate training of Georgia log truck drivers.

Due to low qualification requirements and low pay, log truck drivers are often the least trained and qualified truck drivers on the road. Log truck drivers can be 18 rather than 21, and with only a brief Commercial Driver’s License training course that covers nothing about the unique hazards of log trucks. They are often nice people but are not well trained. The basic Commercial Driver’s License training does not cover anything about extended-length loads of logs or the need to make sure logs are cut shorter for safety. In one recent fatality case, the log truck driver was a recent immigrant from Guatemala who had been driving a truck only a short time and had no training about the specifics of log truck safety.

7. Unconscious bias of rural law enforcement officers in favor of log truck operators.

Nearly all log truck operators, drivers, and crashes are in rural counties where the forest products industry is a major part of the local economy. Everyone in the county – including law enforcement officers and potential jurors — grows accustomed to seeing objectively unsafe practices in log truck operations, so they think the danger is normal. Law enforcement officers and potential jurors in those counties are likely to have friends and relatives who are timber producers and haulers. Knowing this is hard labor, it is only human to be sympathetic to the log truck operator. We are alert to ways of dealing with unconscious bias and overcoming it.

8. Inadequate training of law enforcement officers responding to log truck crashes in Georgia.

Even if they are not biased in favor of log truck operators because a friend or relative is one, the rural deputy sheriffs who most often respond to log truck crashes have not been trained on the inadequate Forest Products Trucking Rules. They don’t know that a light in the rear of the load must be clearly visible from 500 feet. They don’t know how many reflectors must be clearly visible on the side of a trailer. They don’t know to ask who loaded the trailer or where they are hauling the logs to. Because they are not trained in this, they do not get a lot of critical information or take the right photos at the scene. At Johnson & Ward, through long experience we have found ways to ferret out critical information that officers not adequately trained in log truck safety do not know to look for.

8. Unfavorable venues for Georgia log truck accident cases.

Lawsuits must be filed in the county where a defendant resides. Logging operators almost always reside in rural counties where the forest products industry is dominant and most jurors have friends and relatives who work in that industry, so they are accustomed to seeing unsafely overloaded log trucks every day. Their sympathies lie with the log truck operator. At Johnson & Ward, through long experience we have succeeded in securing venue in urban counties where judges and jurors can view unsafe log truck operations with fresh eyes.

If a tragic log truck accident has impacted you or your family, contact us today. Let our experience work for you.

Log trucks crashes are distressingly common tragedies across rural Georgia, often causing death or terrible injuries.

Most log trucks operating in the middle of Georgia operate exclusively intrastate, inside the state of Georgia, and do not cross state lines. They are governed by the Georgia Forest Product Trucking Rules, which exempt applicability of numerous provisions of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations. Log trucks operating near state lines may cross into neighboring states, subjecting them to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations.

Length of loads.

Log trucks in rural Georgia frequently operate in darkness with tree length loads extending 20 feet beyond the rear of the trailer. Often the logs sag down in the rear, obscuring trailer tail lights. This presents severe hazard both when drivers approach from the rear under circumstances in which the end of the load is not clearly visible.

Here a photo from a crash in which an eyewitness confirmed that the rear of the load was sagging and the amber light on the end of the load of logs had been flickering on and off for 10 miles before the log truck turned only to major highway. Miraculously, the driver of the pickup truck survived.

Extended log loads also create a hazard when a log truck turns and the end of the load swings out into another lane.

Conspicuity of projecting loads.

“Conspicuity” is a fancy word for visible. It means “easily seen or noticed; readily visible or observable.” When loads extend more than four feet from the end of the trailer, they are required to have a strobe or LED light flashing 60 times per minute and plainly visible from 500 feet. See O.C.G.A § 40-8-23  and Georgia Forest Products Trucking Rules, Section 4-393.11PL. Unfortunately, many local law enforcement officers and even state troopers have too little training to recognize violations and their significance. They often ignore violations and blame dead victims.

For daytime conspicuity, the end of the load must also be marked with a flag of bright red or orange fluorescent color and shall be not less than 18 inches square. Of course, a flag alone is no help in the ark.

In addition, the Georgia Forests Products Trucking Rules include specifications and diagrams for placement of reflectors and reflecting tape. In the real world, those rules are rarely enforced. Here is a comparison between the requirements and reality in a log trailer involved in a fatal crash when it made a U-turn across traffic lanes in predawn darkness,

With the overloaded log truck violating the rules on lights and reflectors, here is an illustration of what was visible to an oncoming driver about a second before impact with logs extending in the dark across his lane of travel.

Insurance.  Intrastate commercial trucks operating only in Georgia, including log trucks, are only required to carry $100,000 liability insurance coverage, which is horribly inadequate in any of the catastrophic crashes they are likely to cause. Many, however, are contractually bound by paper companies to which they haul logs to carry $1,000,000 liability insurance.

Logging trucks near state lines may cross to paper mills in neighboring states. When operating in interstate commerce, they are subject to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations. Interstate commercial motor vehicles are required to have at least $750,000 liability insurance coverage, but most have $1,000,000 coverage, sometimes more. When dump trucks haul certain agricultural commodities within 150 miles from the source, they are exempt from certain regulations.

Log truck drivers generally are paid less than over the road truckers in interstate commerce. We understand that most log truck owners and drivers are decent people. A high school classmate spent most of his life as a pulpwood hauler.  Some good, experienced truck drivers choose to make less money in order to be home every night. However, our observation in log truck crash cases has been that they are generally less experienced, less trained and less sophisticated. We had one case in which a log truck driver who had been fired from an over-the-road truck driving job could only find work driving a log truck. Within two months of starting, he made a U-turn in predawn darkness, leaving his unilluminated log of logs extended

Log truck drivers are required to have a Commercial Driver’s License (CDL).  He was intelligent and a good guy. However, the Georgia Forest Products Trucking Rules exempt a lot of driver qualification rules governing interstate truckers. They may drive a log truck at 18 rather than 21, need not be even minimally literate, are not required to pass road tests, or be subject to rules on background screening, safe driving hours, etc.,

Maintenance of log trucks is often substandard. The Georgia Forest Product Trucking Rules exempt intrastate log trucks from the daily safety inspection of trucks and trailers required under the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations. Because log trucks often operate in rough areas at in forests, they take a beating. Without a requirement of daily pre-trip and post-trip inspections, it is common to see a log truck that has taken a beating. Tires, brakes and suspension may be in bad shape, and required lamps and reflectors are often missing or caked with mud.

If you or a loved one are badly harmed in a catastrophic accident involving a log truck in Georgia, it is important to act immediately to preserve crucial evidence.

 is a 2019 recipient of the “Tradition of Excellence” Award from the State Bar of Georgia General Practice & Trial Section.

Mr. Shigley is the first Georgia lawyer to earn three national board certifications in his practice area from the National Board of Trial Advocacy – in Civil Trial Law, Civil Practice Law and Truck Accident Law. He is a board member of the Academy of Truck Accident Attorneys, and former chair of the American Association for Justice Motor Vehicle Collision, Highway & Premises Liability Section, which includes the Trucking Litigation Group. 

He is lead author of Georgia Law of Torts: Trial Preparation and Practice, now in its tenth annual edition with Thomson Reuters West. His law practice is focused on catastrophic injury and wrongful death including those arising from commercial trucking accidents and those involving brain, neck, back, spinal cord, amputation and burn injuries. 

In 2011-12, Mr. Shigley was president of the State  Bar of Georgia, which includes all the lawyers and judges in Georgia.  He also is a former chair of the Institute for Legal Education in Georgia (board member 2008-2019, chair 2012-13),  State Bar of Georgia Tort & Insurance Practice Section (1994-95), and the Georgia Insurance Law Institute (1994). 

A former prosecutor and former insurance defense lawyer, Mr. Shigley is a graduate of Furman University and Emory University Law School. He is a widower,  father of two adult children, and an elder in his church.