If you were hit by a car as a pedestrian, get medical care now, call 911, document the scene, and say nothing to insurance companies. What to do after a pedestrian accident in the first 72 hours decides your health, your evidence, and the value of your personal injury claim.
Knowing what to do after an accident is the starting point. This guide walks you through every move hour by hour: evidence to lock in, insurance traps to avoid, who pays, and when to call a lawyer.
What to do after a pedestrian accident comes down to four moves in this exact order: protect your body, protect the record, protect the evidence, and protect your statements.
The first 72 hours matter because four things happen at once: hidden injuries surface, evidence disappears, insurance companies move fast, and the spine of your claim gets locked in.
The first 24 hours after a pedestrian accident are about three things: getting treated, getting the crash on the record, and getting yourself out of further danger. Everything else waits.
Go to the ER or call an ambulance, even if you can walk. Pedestrian crashes routinely cause head trauma, internal bleeding, and spinal injuries that don’t show symptoms for hours. Tell the doctor about every area that hurts. Prompt medical care after an accident is the strongest evidence insurers can’t argue with.
Call 911 from the scene before anyone leaves. The responding officer creates the police report, and that report becomes the official version of what happened. Stick to facts when you give your account. Don’t guess speeds, don’t apologize, and don’t say, “I didn’t see the car.”
If you can move without making injuries worse, get out of traffic. A second crash at the scene is a real risk on highways and busy intersections. If you can’t move, stay still and wait for paramedics. Don’t accept a ride from the driver.
The next 24 to 48 hours are for evidence and memory. Once shock fades and adrenaline drops, you have a narrow window to capture what happened before details blur and proof disappears.
Photograph every injury daily, in good light. Bruises darken, swelling shifts, and cuts heal fast. The progression itself strengthens your claim. Go back to the scene if you can, or send someone. Get wide shots of the intersection, crosswalk markings, traffic signals, and skid marks. Save the clothes and shoes you were wearing, unwashed.
Collect every name, number, and statement within 48 hours. Witnesses get harder to reach by the day. Confirm the driver’s name, license, insurance, and plate from the police report, and request a correction if anything’s missing.
Write down what hurts, when it hurts, and what you can’t do. Pain levels, missed work, canceled plans, and sleep problems all become part of your damages. Memory blurs after a few days, and a journal kept day by day is far more credible than one reconstructed weeks later.
By hour 48, the focus shifts from gathering to protecting. Your medical paper trail is starting to build, insurance is calling, and what you say (or don’t say) in the next 24 hours can shape your settlement for months.
Keep every bill, prescription, and discharge paper from day one. ER reports, imaging results, follow-up appointments, physical therapy referrals, and out-of-pocket costs all count toward your damages. Use a folder, a phone album, or both.
Report the accident to your own insurance within their deadline, usually 24 to 72 hours. Stick to the basics: date, location, that you were hit, and that you’re treating injuries. Don’t speculate about fault, severity, or how the crash happened.
Refuse any recorded statement until you’ve spoken to a lawyer. Recordings are reviewed for inconsistencies and used to reduce or deny your claim. You are not legally required to give one to the driver’s insurer.
The strongest pedestrian accident claims are built on evidence collected in the first 72 hours. Use this checklist before each item disappears.
What you don’t do in the first 72 hours protects your claim as much as what you do.
Pedestrian crashes cause severe injuries because there’s nothing between you and the vehicle. The most common ones fall into five categories, and most victims have more than one at the same time.
A full record of every pedestrian accident injury on day one keeps insurers from arguing later that some came from somewhere else.
In most pedestrian accident cases, the driver who hit you pays through their auto liability insurance. But pedestrian claims rarely stay simple, and the bill often gets split across two or three sources.
The driver’s liability policy is the first place to file. It covers your medical bills, lost wages, and pain and suffering up to the policy limit, which pedestrian injuries often blow past on the first hospital visit. A car accident lawyer can find every layer of coverage that applies.
When the driver’s coverage runs out (or they have none), your own auto policy can step in through uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage, even though you weren’t in a car. Most people don’t know this, and adjusters don’t volunteer it.
| Source | When it pays | What it covers |
| Driver’s liability insurance | Driver is at fault and has coverage | Medical bills, lost wages, pain and suffering |
| Your UM/UIM coverage | Driver has no insurance or not enough | Same as above, up to your policy limit |
| Multiple defendants | Rideshare, delivery, or commercial vehicle involved | Company policies often have higher limits |
| Health insurance | Medical bills while the claim is pending | ER, surgery, follow-ups (often reimbursed later) |
| Out of pocket | Coverage gaps or denied claims | Anything not covered above |
If a rideshare driver, delivery worker, or commercial truck driver hit you, the case changes shape. Companies like Uber, Lyft, FedEx, and Amazon carry policies with much higher limits, especially relevant in injury cases in Chicago and other major metro areas.
If a pedestrian caused the accident, fault rarely falls 100% on one side. Most states use comparative fault, which splits liability based on each person’s share of the blame. You can still recover compensation, but the amount drops by your percentage.
Say the driver was speeding and you crossed outside the crosswalk. If fault gets assigned 70/30, a $100,000 claim becomes $70,000.
In some states, you recover nothing once you hit 50% or 51% fault. That’s why working with a Chicago car accident lawyer early shapes how fault gets framed in the first 72 hours.
Every hour you wait in the first 72 chips away at your settlement. Insurance companies build claim value on three pillars: medical proof, physical evidence, and what you said earlier. Weaken any one, and the offer drops.
Starting a pedestrian injury claim takes five steps, and the order matters. Each one sets up the next.
Most pedestrian claims that fall apart fail at step 4 or 5, not step 1. The medical part is intuitive. The legal and insurance part is where pressure, deadlines, and traps start.
Insurance companies do not work for you, even when the friendly voice on the phone makes it sound otherwise. Their job is to close your case for as little money as possible, and the first 72 hours give them their best shot.
Three tactics show up in almost every pedestrian claim:
You are not legally required to give the driver’s insurer a recorded statement. Spotting these insurance company tactics early is the difference between a fair settlement and a closed case for cents on the dollar.
If the driver fled, call 911 right away and report what you saw: vehicle make, color, partial license plate, and direction of travel. Ask officers to check nearby surveillance within 48 hours before footage is overwritten.
You can still recover through your own uninsured motorist (UM) coverage, even as a pedestrian. Your UM claim depends almost entirely on the police report and what you preserved at the scene.
Call a pedestrian accident lawyer today if you have serious injuries, fault is disputed, insurance is already pressuring you, or evidence is slipping away. The earlier a lawyer steps in, the less leverage the other side has.
Four signals tell you it’s time to call:
A pedestrian accident lawyer does three things you can’t do alone: protect evidence before it disappears, build the strategy your claim needs to hold its value, and negotiate directly with adjusters so they stop calling you. Working with a personal injury lawyer early often changes the entire arc of the case.
If you were hit by a car as a pedestrian, don’t deal with insurance alone. We help you protect your claim early, before the driver’s insurer locks in their offer. Contact Thompson Law for a free consultation with a pedestrian accident lawyer. No fee unless we win.
The first 72 hours after a pedestrian accident break down into three priorities, in this exact order: take care of your body, lock in the evidence, and protect your claim from insurance.
| Window | Priority | Key actions |
| First 24 hours (Day 0–1) | Safety + medical | Get ER care, call 911, file the police report, and move to safety |
| 24–48 hours (Day 1–2) | Documentation | Photograph injuries daily, gather witnesses, and start an injury journal |
| 48–72 hours (Day 2–3) | Claim protection | Save medical records, notify your insurer, and refuse recorded statements |
Get medical care, call 911, document the scene, and refuse recorded statements to insurance. The first 72 hours decide your claim’s value.
Yes. Adrenaline hides head trauma, internal bleeding, and soft tissue damage for hours. A same-day ER record is the strongest medical evidence in your case.
You can still recover compensation in most states. Comparative fault reduces your settlement by your percentage of blame, and some states bar recovery once you reach 50% or 51% fault.
The driver’s auto liability insurance pays first. If they have no coverage or not enough, your own uninsured motorist (UM) policy can step in, even though you weren’t in a car.
Most states give you 2 to 3 years from the date of the accident, but deadlines vary. Wait too long, and you lose the right to file entirely.
Scene photos, the police report, witness contacts, medical records, the clothes you were wearing, and any nearby surveillance footage captured within 48 hours.
Today. Call before you give any statement to insurance, before you accept any offer, and before evidence disappears.
Sí. En Thompson Law, atendemos en español a las víctimas de accidentes de peatones. Ponte en contacto con Thompson Law para una consulta gratuita. No cobramos a menos que ganemos el caso. Este contenido tiene únicamente fines informativos y no constituye asesoramiento jurídico. Las leyes y los plazos varían según el estado.
Thompson Law charges NO FEE unless we obtain a settlement for your case. We’ve put over $1.9 billion in cash settlements in our clients’ pockets. Contact us today for a free, no-obligation consultation to discuss your accident, get your questions answered, and understand your legal options.
State law limits the time you have to file a claim after an injury accident, so call today.
