motorman587 Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 Almost ate it today. Going to this...... http://www.tallahassee.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080712/NEWS01/807120319&referrer=FRONTPAGECAROUSEL Running lights and siren on a four lane road. Myself, police car and a fire truck got caught up a light. Traffic would not move out of the way. I was behind the police car. Once we cleared the intersection I was going to hop up to the next to clear the intersection. So went to the right of the police car and was passing. I was about a car length in front of the police car, when a car on my left pulled out. I remember saying, "Not good", I just did what I have been trained to do over the years. I got hard on the brakes and I mean hard. At the last possible mili-second I swerved, nearly missing the reared of the car. Luckly for me the car driver did stop and kept moving. I think my pants leg may have bush it. I thought that forsure the police car had it the car because we where so close, but I looked in the mirror and the cop car was still behind me. Later after the fire and it was calm at the scene I found out the cop car left 200 feet of skid marks. Lucky day for me, not so for the that little girls. I was shaken and upset, but ok. Started to think what is important in life, kind of moments. Scared the $hit out of me. Remember get some training and "Brake and swerve".
Boffin Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 John, glad you made it and thanks for the heads-up. So sad for the child and her family. The staff at the centre will probably never forgive themselves either. The fact that a car can do this to two cops and a fire-truck running code is why I do bother to use extra lighting, modulators etc. I think that I may drop my guard a bit if I did. off out now to practice brake and swerve. Andy
Marty Hill Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 John, Glad your ok. Amazing how people can be so blind.
Marek Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 off out now to practice brake and swerve. Andy that's what I was doing wrong - I used to brake and swear!!! Note to myself brake and swerve from now on. Great job John. Mark
Bud Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 John, Glad to hear your training paid off and you are OK.
Wheels Rollin' Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 Running lights and siren on a four lane road... ... I was about a car length in front of the police car, when a car on my left pulled out. Sure glad you were not injured in this, John -- and obviously, I offer my condolences to the girl's family... I can't imagine what they must be going through <>... OK... So... uh... what exactly was this driver's excuse? Geez Louise! Running lights... Sirens... What more visual and aural stimulation would they need to have it register 'EMERGENCY VEHICLES' and either stay put or move out of the way to allow safe passage? But to... to pull out in front of oncoming emergency vehicles? <>... Man! '... Right of way, eh? It's MY right to go any way I want in spite of what you say and do... To h**l with yours...' Hmmm... Some attitude... How else could I interpret it based on the driver's actions? Sheesh! <>... ~ Bill
ShovelStrokeEd Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 Wow! John, glad you are OK. In an urban enviornment, sirens are just so common as to be background noise to many. Also, there is a good chance that between the AC fan, the stereo and the certainly closed windows, the audio level of the sirens may well be background noise to begin with. The internal rear view mirror would have been useless in this situation and most drivers either don't bother with the right side rear view or are confused by the distortion caused by the wide angle curvature of the mirror and cannot judge distance. Absent the auditory alert, the driver may have attached no significance to the lights. Poor driver training to be sure, but a fact of life here where not much more than a pulse is required to obtain a driver's license. To mind, just another proof of the fallacy of conspicuity as safety thing.
DOK Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 register 'EMERGENCY VEHICLES' and either stay put or move out of the way OK, first things first, let's make it clear that I am not passing judgement on anyone involved in this situation - I wasn't there, so I can't. I am just glad that no one was hurt - apart from that poor little girl. Let me offer a thought as to why the driver may have moved over. The OP states that he passed the police car on the right - ie the inside. The driver may well have seen/heard the multiple sirens and lights panicked and decided to get out of the way by pulling in to the right. The OP was, presumably, accelerating hard from behind the police car and passing on the inside - therefore invisible (at that point) to the driver in front and to the left of the police car.
motorman587 Posted July 12, 2008 Author Posted July 12, 2008 register 'EMERGENCY VEHICLES' and either stay put or move out of the way OK, first things first, let's make it clear that I am not passing judgement on anyone involved in this situation - I wasn't there, so I can't. I am just glad that no one was hurt - apart from that poor little girl. Let me offer a thought as to why the driver may have moved over. The OP states that he passed the police car on the right - ie the inside. The driver may well have seen/heard the multiple sirens and lights panicked and decided to get out of the way by pulling in to the right. The OP was, presumably, accelerating hard from behind the police car and passing on the inside - therefore invisible (at that point) to the driver in front and to the left of the police car. First I enjoy peoples judgement on these forums, so do not hold back. I enjoy the corrections on my pen-men-ship, cause I sure can not spell,grammer etc......So corrects are noted. After re-reading my post I, of course, found an error. I was passing another police vehicle, unmarked, but had lights and sirens on. So the person on was my right, not left, as first posted, pulling out of a parking place. The person was attempting to cut across both lanes to go westbound. We were going eastbound to the call. Had the person stopped and looked, looked hard they would've see me in the inside lane, lights and siren, the cop car in the outside lane with lights and siren and in the background a hugh large "RED" fire truck. Brake and Swerve...........
DOK Posted July 12, 2008 Posted July 12, 2008 OK, so the facts are actually quite different - in that case, the driver was clealy not looking very carefully FWIW, I guess this is an example of the problem riders face - motorbikes are, relatively, very small objects on the road. Let's be generous and assume this driver did actually look, what did his/her brain register: first, a great big red fire truck, some way back (I'm assuming the distance); then, possibly, a smaller, unmarked police car; and then, IF YOU ARE LUCKY, a much smaller motorcycle.
motorman587 Posted July 13, 2008 Author Posted July 13, 2008 OK, so the facts are actually quite different - in that case, the driver was clealy not looking very carefully FWIW, I guess this is an example of the problem riders face - motorbikes are, relatively, very small objects on the road. Let's be generous and assume this driver did actually look, what did his/her brain register: first, a great big red fire truck, some way back (I'm assuming the distance); then, possibly, a smaller, unmarked police car; and then, IF YOU ARE LUCKY, a much smaller motorcycle. No the fact are pretty much the same..........they failed to yield to emergency vehicle. Now if you like to make excuses for this person or what we call contributing factors, but the facts are pretty much the same. If they had come from the left or the right, or if it was marked or unmarked, still had siren and lights. They had two lanes plus of light coming at them. I will not tell you that we were coming over a hill too.....
DOK Posted July 13, 2008 Posted July 13, 2008 Motorman, read my post carefully. I am not making excuses for anyone, you or the other driver. I am merely commenting that, assuming the driver did look (and it is an assumption, I wasn't in the car with him/her), there is a reason why he/she might not have registered your vehicle. I made no comment whatsoever about the driver's decision to pull out. Oh, and by the way, the facts are different from your first post.
BailyD Posted July 13, 2008 Posted July 13, 2008 John, Nearly everyday we travel lights and siren and it amazes me how cars waiting to enter traffic "look" my way, then pull out. Last night (twilight) I was traveling lights siren and ended up getting pretty darn close to intersection. I was watching the person sitting there wating to pull into my lane and head the same way. He pulled out (he had room enough), drove for a little bit, then pulled over. If he had looked properly he never would have pulled out.
ShovelStrokeEd Posted July 13, 2008 Posted July 13, 2008 OK, first things first, let's make it clear that I am not passing judgement on anyone involved in this situation - I wasn't there, so I can't. I am just glad that no one was hurt - apart from that poor little girl. Let me offer a thought as to why the driver may have moved over. The OP states that he passed the police car on the right - ie the inside. The driver may well have seen/heard the multiple sirens and lights panicked and decided to get out of the way by pulling in to the right. The OP was, presumably, accelerating hard from behind the police car and passing on the inside - therefore invisible (at that point) to the driver in front and to the left of the police car. First I enjoy peoples judgement on these forums, so do not hold back. I enjoy the corrections on my pen-men-ship, cause I sure can not spell,grammer etc......So corrects are noted. After re-reading my post I, of course, found an error. I was passing another police vehicle, unmarked, but had lights and sirens on. So the person on was my right, not left, as first posted, pulling out of a parking place. The person was attempting to cut across both lanes to go westbound. We were going eastbound to the call. Had the person stopped and looked, looked hard they would've see me in the inside lane, lights and siren, the cop car in the outside lane with lights and siren and in the background a hugh large "RED" fire truck. Brake and Swerve........... OK, horse of an entirely different color. Doubtful the person looked hard at all. If anything, the registered the nearest object presenting a possible danger to them, the car running code in the lane one over from the one they were about to enter. If they saw you at all, you would have registered as much further back due to your smaller size and closer spaced lights. Those same factors made it difficult to judge your speed as well and most people cannot judge speed of something approaching in their mirrors. THEN THEY PULLED A TOTAL BONEHEAD MOVE. Pulling out in front of you and then the car. WHEN YOU SEE VEHICLES APPROACHING RUNNING CODE, STAY F**KING PUT OR MOVE TO THE RIGHT IF IT IS SAFE TO DO SO. Again, glad the twins got to see Daddy that night.
Laura Posted July 13, 2008 Posted July 13, 2008 Again, glad the twins got to see Daddy that night. Indeed !
AZKomet Posted July 13, 2008 Posted July 13, 2008 Thank heaven you are ok....I always find it amazing as to the dangers in code 3 ops. My wife would ride with me @ times in the squad car and she would get so upset at the jacka$$e$ that would not yield or move over during a run. If it was their a$$ in trouble they would want help yesterday!! Too bad for the young girl. That in itself is tragic. I find people to be lacking in the dangers of public servants. One would think that PSA's by the fire, l/e departments etc would be a common thing among TV and radio. Not much interest in that though here in AZ.
motorman587 Posted July 13, 2008 Author Posted July 13, 2008 Motorman, read my post carefully. I am not making excuses for anyone, you or the other driver. I am merely commenting that, assuming the driver did look (and it is an assumption, I wasn't in the car with him/her), there is a reason why he/she might not have registered your vehicle. I made no comment whatsoever about the driver's decision to pull out. Oh, and by the way, the facts are different from your first post. I misunderstood, not a big deal. Speed was a factor too, because I know I was not going the speed limit, which was 45mph. This incident has slow me down responding to calls or catching up speeders. Just not worth it now with the twins. It scared the pi$$ out of me.
Quinn Posted July 13, 2008 Posted July 13, 2008 Thank heaven you are ok....I always find it amazing as to the dangers in code 3 ops. My wife would ride with me @ times in the squad car and she would get so upset at the jacka$$e$ that would not yield or move over during a run. If it was their a$$ in trouble they would want help yesterday!! Too bad for the young girl. That in itself is tragic. I find people to be lacking in the dangers of public servants. One would think that PSA's by the fire, l/e departments etc would be a common thing among TV and radio. Not much interest in that though here in AZ. Maybe the reason there's not much interest in PSA for the fire departments is that things on fire are only about ten degrees warmer than normal in Arizona.
AZKomet Posted July 13, 2008 Posted July 13, 2008 Thank heaven you are ok....I always find it amazing as to the dangers in code 3 ops. My wife would ride with me @ times in the squad car and she would get so upset at the jacka$$e$ that would not yield or move over during a run. If it was their a$$ in trouble they would want help yesterday!! Too bad for the young girl. That in itself is tragic. I find people to be lacking in the dangers of public servants. One would think that PSA's by the fire, l/e departments etc would be a common thing among TV and radio. Not much interest in that though here in AZ. Maybe the reason there's not much interest in PSA for the fire departments is that things on fire are only about ten degrees warmer than normal in Arizona. how true!
MotorinLA Posted July 14, 2008 Posted July 14, 2008 Glad you're okay John. If I get your correction right, the person was making a U-turn from the curb, crossing both of the same direction lanes during the turn. As far as I know, this is illegal in most U.S. states. This is exactly how I got in my first (and so far only) motorcycle collision, long before I became a police officer. An idiot made a U-turn from the curb directly into my path. Nothing like hitting a car that is completely perpendicluar to your direction of travel at about 20 mph :frown: A very dangerous turning movement. Side note: You out-run your siren at 35-40 mph. Basically your siren is worthless to vehicles ahead of you if you're going faster than this speed (yes, yes, I know about the speed of sound, however, the effectiveness of an emergency vehicle siren nonetheless becomes very reduced at greater vehicle speeds.) Pay attention next time an emergency vehicle approaches from behind you or from the opposite direction on the freeway. I can pretty much guarantee you that you'll not hear it until it's right on top of you. Just some food for thought.
BailyD Posted July 14, 2008 Posted July 14, 2008 To all guy/gals who ride. Did you ever get a bad feeling on a particular day that you were riding? On the 4th of July I started my shift mid day. Almost immediately a person in a car failed to stop. When the driver failed to yield I let him go (followed guidelines for pursuit driving). I could very easily have kept up, but I knew it was the right thing to do when he was going 70-80 through a residential development running stop signs. I figured out who it was immediately. I had a bad feeling the minute I started my shift and now I was getting that "hair standing up" on the back of my neck when it was nearly 90 degrees. I found the car and impounded it. I left the impound lot feeling VERY cautious. As I was riding on a thru street a Mercedes Benz SUV ran a stop sign directly in my path at 50 mph. Full threshold braking, swerving onto shoulder. I think it was more luck than skill. It was a blind intersection and she missed me by 1 second. My hands were shaking as I issued the summons to her. Now I am really spooked. The VERY bad man I chased got away that day. Maybe because he was suppose to. Maybe he would have rammed me or shot me in his attempt to elude (I was alone). Then a woman nearly runs me over dead as a door nail one hour later. I start doing my paperwork and noticed that the suspect, the innocent driver of the car he crashed into while running and myself were all born the same day and month. What are the chances? I went home early that night, parked the PD's bike and stayed in with my wife and baby daughter.
AZKomet Posted July 14, 2008 Posted July 14, 2008 There is a stop sign 1/4 mile from my home. The main street winds downhill from the mountain street and intersects a smaller street with a 4 way stop sign. Every morning and PM is a crap shooot as to who will stop. I got Phx motors to monitor the sign for weeks on end. (one motor had 16 tickets in an hour period for a variety of things to include speed and stop sign violations) The reality is that some people are not cautious and have no desire to follow regulatory codes for traffic. It is scary to think that one would purposefully run a stop sign and cause a crash b/c that is what will eventually happen. We are a society of thinkers that believe that we will deal with the aftermath later....many of the violators know the sign is there but is in a hurry. AMAZING!!!
tallman Posted July 14, 2008 Posted July 14, 2008 John, Glad you're OK. Awful event to respond to. Students give me a hard time at fire drills because I require silence during evacuation, then call roll. There is a reason. Up in the mountains, see you soon.
ERdok Posted July 15, 2008 Posted July 15, 2008 John, Glad you're okay. Prayers to the family of the little girl. Rick
motorman587 Posted July 15, 2008 Author Posted July 15, 2008 Thank heaven you are ok....I always find it amazing as to the dangers in code 3 ops. My wife would ride with me @ times in the squad car and she would get so upset at the jacka$$e$ that would not yield or move over during a run. If it was their a$$ in trouble they would want help yesterday!! Too bad for the young girl. That in itself is tragic. I find people to be lacking in the dangers of public servants. One would think that PSA's by the fire, l/e departments etc would be a common thing among TV and radio. Not much interest in that though here in AZ. Maybe the reason there's not much interest in PSA for the fire departments is that things on fire are only about ten degrees warmer than normal in Arizona. how true! I am going to try this again. I was eastbound on a 4 lane highway. Myself and unmarked police car just left a place of, "food". We heard the call and we also heard that the fire truck was behind us. We came up to the first intersection. Cars would not move. Unmark car was in front, I in the middle and now the fire truck was behind. I fiqured I would catch the next intersection and clear it for the fire truck. Once we cleared the intersection and I went to the right lane and started to pass the unmarked car. I got about a litte in front of the front of the car when I saw, A car to my right started to pull from a driveway or street. The car pulled in front of me where I thougt I was going to hit them. I applied heavy brakes and then served. I thougth forsure the unmarked hit them. Myself, unmarked and fire truck were all lights and siren. I and the unmarked missed the the car that came from my right. I am not mad at the person that pulled in front of me. I know that what I was doing was not normal for that person.
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