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New Orleans Interstate Accident Lawyers
I-10 through this city is one of the most punishing stretches of road in Louisiana. Higher speeds, sudden stops, construction that never ends, and drivers from three states who have no idea what is coming. When it goes wrong up there, it goes very wrong.
35,000+Cases won
1979Serving NOLA Since
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The Short Version
Interstate crashes - the quick answers
- Highway speeds turn survivable crashes into catastrophic ones. The physics are not negotiable.
- Multi-vehicle pileups mean multiple defendants - and every one of them will blame the others.
- Out-of-state drivers complicate everything: different insurers, different policies, and a defendant who has gone home.
- Commercial trucks are everywhere on I-10, and truck cases run on federal rules and electronic data.
- Construction zones can create claims against contractors and highway authorities, not just drivers.
- Since January 1, 2026, being found 51% or more at fault means you recover nothing.
- You generally have 2 years to file (for crashes on or after July 1, 2024).
Wrecked on the interstate? We're on your side.
Anyone who drives here knows the stretches. The Claiborne corridor where I-10 stacks up without warning. The Pontchartrain Expressway merges where three lanes become two and nobody yields. The high rise. The Twin Span, out over the water, where the wind and the rain arrive together. The construction that has been there so long it feels permanent.
The interstate does not forgive a mistake the way a surface street does. Sixty-five miles an hour turns a rear-end collision into a life-changing event, and it turns one careless driver into a six-car chain reaction where everybody blames everybody. Those are hard cases. They are also exactly the cases that need somebody who knows these roads.
- Preserve traffic and DOTD camera footage before it cycles
- Get a reconstructionist to the scene while the evidence is still there
- Pull the event data recorders from every vehicle, including the trucks
- Establish the impact sequence in a multi-vehicle pileup
- Send spoliation letters when a commercial carrier is involved
- Handle out-of-state drivers, insurers, and jurisdictional issues
- Investigate construction zones, road defects, and highway conditions
- Fight the fault percentage that the new 51% rule now makes decisive
What to do after an interstate crash
Highway scenes get cleared fast, and the evidence goes with them. What you capture in the first thirty minutes may be all anyone ever gets.
1
Get to safety, then call 911
On an interstate, a second collision is a genuine risk. Get off the travel lanes if you can do it safely, put on hazards, and stay out of the road.
2
Photograph the positions before anything moves
Vehicles, debris field, skid marks, lane markings, the guardrail, the construction cones. Highway scenes are cleared quickly because the road has to reopen, and the physical evidence goes with the tow trucks.
3
Get every vehicle
In a multi-car pileup, photograph every car, every plate, and every driver's information - not just the one that hit you. You may not know for hours who actually caused it.
4
Get witnesses before they drive away
This matters more on a highway than anywhere else. Witnesses on an interstate are strangers passing through, and once they merge back into traffic they are gone forever.
5
Note out-of-state plates carefully
An out-of-state driver introduces a different insurer, different coverage, and a defendant who will be several states away by dinner. Get everything.
6
Call the Forstalls quickly
Traffic and DOTD cameras, commercial vehicle data, and construction records all have retention limits. On the interstate, speed matters twice.
Speed Changes Everything
Sixty-five miles an hour is not thirty-five twice.
Kinetic energy rises with the square of speed, which is the physics way of saying that a highway crash is not a bad version of a city crash - it is a categorically different event. That is why interstate wrecks produce traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, and fatalities at a rate surface streets simply do not. And it is why these cases have to be built for what they actually are from day one.
What governs an interstate crash
Highway cases pull in more law, more defendants, and more moving parts than an ordinary city collision.
Comparative Fault - and the 51% Cliff
In a chain-reaction pileup, fault gets carved up among many drivers. Since January 1, 2026, if you are assigned 51% or more, you recover nothing at all. In a multi-vehicle case where everyone is pointing at everyone, that percentage fight is the whole case.
Federal Trucking Rules Apply Up There
I-10 is a freight corridor. When a commercial truck is involved, FMCSA regulations, electronic logging data, and event data recorders come into play - and a spoliation letter needs to go out immediately.
Out-of-State Drivers & Insurers
A crash with a driver from Texas, Mississippi, or Florida raises questions of coverage, jurisdiction, and service. It does not defeat your claim - but it does mean somebody has to do real work fast.
Construction Zones
A crash caused by a poorly designed, badly marked, or improperly maintained work zone may support a claim against a contractor - and in some circumstances a public entity, which carries its own procedures and damage caps.
Road Defects & Design
Standing water, potholes, missing signage, faded striping, damaged guardrails. Claims involving highway conditions may involve a public entity, with shorter notice requirements and a statutory cap on general damages.
2 Years to File
For crashes on or after July 1, 2024, you generally have two years. But when a public entity may be involved, additional notice requirements can arrive much sooner.
This page is general information, not legal advice. Every case turns on its own facts - call us and we'll tell you where you actually stand.
Why interstate cases are different
A highway wreck is not simply a car accident that happened faster. The speed changes the injuries, the volume changes the defendants, and the geography changes the evidence.
Here is what is actually different, and why it matters from the first week.
The SpeedHighway impacts produce brain and spinal injuries at a rate surface streets do not come close to
The PileupSix cars, six drivers, six insurers - and every one of them pointing at somebody else
The 51% CliffIn a chain reaction, fault percentages are everything. Cross the line and you get nothing
The TrucksI-10 is a freight route. Truck cases mean federal rules, electronic data, and a rapid response team
The Out-of-State DriverA different insurer, a different state, and a defendant who is home before you leave the hospital
The Scene DisappearsThe road has to reopen. Within an hour, the physical evidence is on a tow truck
Types of interstate crashes
The interstates through this region each have their own character and their own failure modes. I-10 through the city, I-610 as the bypass everyone takes at the last second, the Pontchartrain Expressway funneling into the CBD, the Twin Span out over the lake, I-510 and the Chef Menteur corridor toward the east.
What they share is speed, volume, and very little margin for error.
Rear-End Collisions at SpeedMulti-Vehicle PileupsChain-Reaction Crashes18-Wheeler CollisionsLane-Change & Merge CrashesBlind Spot CollisionsSideswipesRolloversConstruction Zone CrashesStalled Vehicle & Debris StrikesWrong-Way DriversDrunk & Drowsy DrivingHydroplaning & Weather CrashesOut-of-State Drivers
Common interstate accident injuries
The difference between a thirty-mile-an-hour impact and a sixty-five-mile-an-hour impact is not double. Kinetic energy scales with the square of velocity, which is why a wreck on the interstate so often produces injuries that a similar wreck on Carrollton simply would not.
These are the injuries that highway speed produces, and they are the reason these cases require life care planning from the outset:
Traumatic Brain InjurySpinal Cord Injuries & ParalysisMultiple FracturesInternal Organ DamageCrush InjuriesAmputationBurnsChest & Rib InjuriesHerniated DiscsPermanent DisabilityPost-Traumatic StressWrongful Death
In a pileup, everybody blames everybody
A six-car chain reaction on I-10 produces six drivers with six accounts, and not one of them saw the whole thing. The car behind you says you stopped short. The car in front says you hit him first. The truck at the head of the line says something in the road caused all of it, and three lanes over somebody saw a car swerve and cannot say whose.
That confusion is not an inconvenience. Under the 51% rule, it is a weapon. Every insurer in that chain now has a powerful financial incentive to push blame onto you specifically - because if they can get you past the line, they pay nothing at all.
Which is why these cases are won with physical evidence rather than testimony. Crush patterns and impact sequence. Debris fields. Event data recorders. Traffic and DOTD camera footage. A reconstructionist can put a six-car pileup back together in the right order. Six drivers with adrenaline and a lawyer cannot.
Compensation in an interstate case
Louisiana law sorts what you can recover into two buckets: the losses you can add up on paper, and the ones you cannot. Both are real, and both are recoverable.
Highway cases skew catastrophic, which means the future care and lost earning capacity are usually far larger than the bills you have already received. And with multiple defendants there are often multiple policies - finding every one of them is frequently the difference between a settlement that runs out and one that lasts.
Economic damages
- Emergency, trauma & surgical care
- Future medical care & rehabilitation
- Long-term and in-home care
- Physical, occupational & cognitive therapy
- Lost wages and lost future earning capacity
- Home and vehicle modifications
- Assistive equipment
- Property damage and total loss
Non-economic damages
- Pain and suffering
- Mental anguish & emotional distress
- Permanent scarring & disfigurement
- Loss of enjoyment of life
- Disability & loss of independence
- Loss of consortium
- Wrongful death and survival damages
What actually changes when a lawyer steps in
A highway scene is cleared within the hour because the road has to reopen. Everything that proves what happened leaves with the tow trucks - unless somebody goes and gets it.
We move on the evidence immediately. Traffic and DOTD camera footage, which is retained for a limited time. The event data recorders in every vehicle involved, including the commercial ones. The 911 audio. The construction contractor's traffic control plan, if a work zone was involved. And a reconstructionist to the scene while the marks are still on the road, because in a pileup the impact sequence is the case.
We find every defendant and every policy. A multi-vehicle crash may involve several drivers, a commercial carrier, a highway contractor, and sometimes a public entity - each with separate coverage, separate counsel, and a shared interest in blaming you. In a catastrophic injury case, that stacked coverage is frequently what makes a real recovery possible.
And we fight the fault percentage, because since January 2026 it is no longer a discount. Past fifty percent, it is the entire claim. In a chain reaction where six insurers are pointing fingers, that fight is not a side issue. It is the whole thing.
Mistakes that can hurt your claim
Interstate cases are lost in the first days, because the scene is gone in an hour and the story hardens before anyone has looked at the physical evidence.
None of the mistakes below are fatal on their own. But on a highway, each one costs more than it would anywhere else.
- Not photographing the scene and the vehicle positions before everything is towed
- Letting witnesses drive away without getting names and numbers
- Assuming the driver who hit you is the only one responsible
- Giving a recorded statement while six insurers are still deciding who to blame
- Waiting while traffic camera footage cycles and gets overwritten
- Letting your vehicle be repaired or scrapped before it is inspected
- Not realizing that a public entity may be involved - with earlier notice deadlines
- Posting about the crash on social media
Recent results for injured clients
A few examples of what we've recovered for people seriously hurt by someone else's negligence.
$2,200,000
Auto Accident
$1,500,000
Catastrophic Injury
$975,000
Serious Injury
$750,000
Head Injury
$485,000
Pedestrian Accident
Prior results do not guarantee or predict a similar outcome. Every case is different and must be evaluated on its own facts.
The Full Picture
Understanding an interstate accident claim
A crash at highway speed is a different event than a crash in traffic, and it produces a different case. More force, more vehicles, more defendants, and an evidence window that closes in about an hour. Here is how these are actually won.
The physics, and why it matters legally
Kinetic energy scales with the square of velocity. Double the speed and you roughly quadruple the energy that has to go somewhere - into the crumple zones, into the restraints, and into the person.
That is why a rear-end collision on Carrollton produces a sore neck, and a rear-end collision at seventy on I-10 produces a traumatic brain injury, a spinal fracture, or a funeral. It is not a difference of degree. It is a difference in kind, and it means these cases must be built as catastrophic-injury cases from the first week - with life care planning, vocational analysis, and neurological workups - rather than as car accident claims that grew.
Insurers understand this perfectly well, and they will still open your file as though it were a fender bender, because a case that gets valued early gets valued cheaply.
In a pileup, the 51% rule is a weapon
A chain-reaction crash on an interstate produces something no other kind of case does: a room full of defendants whose interests are perfectly aligned against you, and perfectly opposed to each other.
Every driver in that chain has a version. Every insurer has an incentive. And since January 1, 2026, Louisiana bars recovery entirely for anyone found 51% or more at fault. Read that again in the context of a six-car pileup where nobody saw the whole thing: each insurer now has a powerful financial reason to argue that you were the one who caused it, because if they can push you one point past the line, they pay nothing at all.
This is precisely why a pileup cannot be argued. It has to be reconstructed. The crush patterns tell an expert the order of impacts. The debris field tells him where each collision occurred. The event data recorders tell him who was braking and who was not. That analysis does not have an adrenaline problem or a lawyer, and it is the only thing that reliably cuts through six competing stories.
“In a pileup, every insurer has a reason to say it was you. The physical evidence does not.”
The freight corridor
I-10 through New Orleans is a working freight route. The port is here. The chemical corridor runs up the river. Trucks move through this city day and night, and when one of them is involved in your crash, the case changes character entirely.
Commercial carriers operate under federal safety regulations covering hours of service, driver qualification, drug testing, and maintenance. Their trucks carry electronic logging devices and event data recorders. Many carry cameras. All of that is evidence you cannot get in an ordinary car case - and much of it can be legally overwritten on a retention schedule if nobody sends a preservation letter.
So the first question we ask in an interstate crash is whether a commercial vehicle was involved. If the answer is yes, the clock is much shorter than you think.
When the road itself is the problem
Not every highway crash is caused by a driver. Sometimes it is caused by the road: a work zone with a bad taper and no advance warning, standing water where the drainage failed, a guardrail that was damaged months ago and never replaced, striping worn away to nothing on a rainy night.
Those facts can support claims against a construction contractor - and, in some circumstances, against a public entity responsible for the roadway. That second category comes with its own rules: earlier notice requirements, procedural traps, and a statutory cap on general damages. It is entirely winnable, but it has to be recognized early, because the deadline to preserve that claim can arrive long before the ordinary two-year filing deadline.
What we need from you
Get medical care and keep going to it. Highway injuries are long-tailed, and the neurological consequences in particular tend to surface weeks later.
Do not let your vehicle be repaired, sold, or scrapped until it has been inspected. In a multi-vehicle case, the crush pattern on your car is a piece of the puzzle nobody else can supply.
Do not give a recorded statement while six insurers are still deciding whom to blame. Anything you say will be shaped into somebody's theory.
And tell us everything, including the parts that worry you. We can work with a bad fact we know about. We cannot work around one that comes off a data recorder in a deposition.
It costs nothing to find out where you stand
You do not owe us anything to have this conversation. The consultation is free, and if we take your case, you pay no attorney's fee unless we recover money for you. If we do not win, you owe us nothing.
Two generations of this family have spent nearly 50 years doing exactly this work for our neighbors in New Orleans. Call us at 504-483-3400, and let's talk about what your case is really worth.
Interstate accident FAQ
Why is a highway crash treated differently than a city crash?
Because the speed changes everything. Kinetic energy scales with the square of velocity, so highway impacts produce traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, and fatalities at rates that surface street collisions do not approach. They also tend to involve more vehicles, commercial trucks, and sometimes highway contractors or public entities - which means more defendants, more policies, and more law.
There were six cars involved. How does anyone figure out who caused it?
With physical evidence rather than testimony. Crush patterns establish the order of impacts. The debris field shows where each collision occurred. Event data recorders show speed and braking. A reconstructionist can put a chain-reaction crash back together in the correct sequence. Six drivers, all of them frightened and none of whom saw the whole thing, cannot.
How does the 51% rule affect a pileup?
Enormously. Since January 1, 2026, anyone found 51% or more at fault in Louisiana recovers nothing. In a multi-vehicle crash, every insurer involved now has a strong financial incentive to argue that you were the one primarily at fault, because pushing you past that line eliminates their obligation entirely. It makes early reconstruction and evidence preservation far more important than they used to be.
The other driver was from out of state. Does that hurt my claim?
It complicates it, but it does not defeat it. Out-of-state drivers bring different insurers, different policy structures, and questions of jurisdiction and service - and they go home quickly. It is a reason to act fast, not a reason to give up.
A truck was involved. What changes?
A great deal. Commercial carriers are governed by federal regulations covering hours of service, driver qualification, drug testing, and maintenance, and their trucks carry electronic data that can prove exactly what happened. But that data can be lawfully overwritten on a retention schedule. A spoliation letter needs to go out immediately, which is the single most time-sensitive act in a case involving a commercial vehicle.
My crash happened in a construction zone. Can I sue the contractor?
Possibly. A work zone that was poorly designed, badly marked, inadequately lit, or improperly maintained can support a claim against the contractor responsible for it. Depending on the facts, a public entity may also be involved - which brings earlier notice requirements and a statutory damage cap. This has to be identified early, because those deadlines can run long before the ordinary filing deadline.
How long do I have to file?
Generally two years for crashes on or after July 1, 2024. But traffic camera footage cycles, commercial vehicle data gets overwritten, and if a public entity may be responsible, notice requirements can arrive much sooner. Do not treat two years as breathing room.
Do I really need a lawyer for an interstate crash?
In almost every case, yes. The injuries are severe, the evidence disappears within the hour, there are usually multiple defendants with aligned incentives to blame you, and the 51% rule now makes the fault fight decisive. The consultation is free, so there is no cost to finding out where you stand.
The Forstalls Take Care of It All
Wrecked on the interstate? Let's talk today.
Tell us what happened. Your consultation is free, there's no obligation, and you pay nothing unless we win.