West v. Laurence

MARKS, J. This is an appeal from a judgment in the sum of $10,633.05 for damages sustained by plaintiff as a result of a collision between an automobile which he was driving south on a public highway in Imperial County, and a semi-trailer being driven north oh the same road by W. K. Kemp. It was owned by Kemp and W. V. Laurence and was being operated on their business. The accident happened about 9 p. m. on August 9, 1944. The night was clear, but dark, and the roadway was dry. The case was tried before the court without a jury and a motion for new trial was denied.

The collision occurred on the old Brawley-Calipatria Highway which runs north and south and has a paved center 16 feet wide with an 8-foot- traversable shoulder on the west side, and another about 6 feet wide on the east side. There is a canal with a substantial west bank on the east side of the road. About 60 feet north of the point of impact is a private road leading into the Stahl Ranch which lies east of the highway and was. the destination of defendants’ truck. This private road crosses the canal by means of a bridge 14 feet wide. It was stipulated that a vehicle of the length of defendants’ truck and semi-trailer could not make the turn into the private road without crossing to the west half of the pavement because of the narrow bridge, although Kemp testified that he could make this turn from the east half of the pavement and that no part of his vehicle was ever west of the center of the highway. The error in this last statement seems to be demonstrated beyond question by the physical facts as well as other evidence and the briefs and arguments of counsel for both parties are based on the assumption that the truck and semi-trailer were straddling the center of the pavement with their west sides west of the center.

Kemp was driving a stake-bodied truck to which was attached a long semi-trailer 84% inches wide. Plaintiff and his wife were riding in a 1934 model sedan. Both testified there were no clearance lights burning on the semi-trailer; that the only illuminated lights on defendants’ vehicle at [91]the time of the collision were its headlights which were similar in appearance to those of an ordinary truck or automobile so that they had no warning that a semi-trailer was attached to the truck until just before the collision.

Plaintiff turned onto the highway about one mile north of the point of collision and proceeded south on his own right hand side of the pavement at a speed of not more than 20 miles an hour. He was driving with his left hand on the steering wheel, his left arm resting on the left front door. (The window was rolled down.) His elbow was protruding about two inches beyond the body of the car and inside of the line of the running board. After turning onto the highway, he and his wife both saw the headlights of the approaching truck. When about 200 feet from it they observed that the truck was straddling the center of the highway and inclining further to the west. Plaintiff slowed down and turned his car to the west and when about 60 feet from the truck he drove 2 or 3 feet still further to the west. When he had passed the headlights of the truck he saw the semi-trailer for the first time. He cleared the truck without hitting it. The left front wheel of his automobile came into contact with some portion of the left front of the semi-trailer and plaintiff’s elbow came into contact with its left front corner, shattering the elbow and seriously and permanently injuring his left arm. The left front tire of the automobile blew out and that wheel was bent. Tire burns and scratches on the pavement started from the point of impact which was between 2 and 3 feet (probably about 2% feet) east of the west edge of the pavement and bore southeasterly in an are until the car came to rest on the bank of the canal to the rear of the truck. Drops of blood paralleled the tire burns about 6 inches northeasterly from them. It is evident that the right wheels of the automobile were between 2 and 3 feet west of the west edge of the pavement and that the semi-trailer occupied 4 or 5 feet of the west, its left, half of the pavement at the time of the collision.