Fire Fighters / Ambulance Crew

Táck

i heard this last night in the pub straight from a serving firemans mouth...

if a fire engine and or ambulance is rushing to a scene of incident, they are technically obliged to follow the rules of the road. if an ambulance driver breaks a red light and causes an accident, the driver will lose his/her licence. therefore when you see an amublance sitting at red lights with the blue lights flashing, they are sitting there because they don't want to lose their licence if an accident occurs.

these laws do not apply to Gardaí in patrol cars.

thats mad isn't it!

KamiKazi

yup, tis true alrite, and yeah its mad but wot ya gonna do??

Táck

well if im ever in a not-so-serious accident i'll ring a garda car to come and bring me to the hospital...

Eoin

T&#225 wrote: »

i heard this last night in the pub straight from a serving firemans mouth...

if a fire engine and or ambulance is rushing to a scene of incident, they are technically obliged to follow the rules of the road. if an ambulance driver breaks a red light and causes an accident, the driver will lose his/her licence. therefore when you see an amublance sitting at red lights with the blue lights flashing, they are sitting there because they don't want to lose their licence if an accident occurs.

these laws do not apply to Gardaí in patrol cars.

thats mad isn't it!

Yeah, they have very few concessions - AFAIK, they can park on a double yellow line, and maybe some other minor concession (possibly use bus lane or something), but otherwise they have to follow the same rules of the road.

When you think about it, if they did cause an accident by breaking a red light, then it's right that they should be done for it - this is dangerous driving.

Suppose they were allowed brake red lights, and there is a crash - does that mean that the poor bastard who had the green light is now at fault?

Táck

i just think that they should be equal with gardaí as to rules of the road.

i mean if it was your mother dying in the back of that ambulance and it stopped at red lights, 50 metres from the hospital, would you say "no rush there lads, she's only my mother"

seamus

Tis true.

Common sense would dictate however that they would never be done for breaking a red light, unless a crash was involved.

Celticfire

In an emergency call emergency service vehicles are allowed to break the rules of the road providing they use due care and caution.They can run red lights , drive on the wrong side of the road and break speed limits.

Rabies

Most drivers have the intelligence to stop when the lights are green to allow an ambulance/ fire truck to pass on red.

Táck

most...not all

sweetie

T&#225 wrote: »

well if im ever in a not-so-serious accident i'll ring a garda car to come and bring me to the hospital...

Was involved in a road accident the other night (kid jumped on the back of my dad's trailer as he drove away and fell off after 20 metres or so) and rang the ambo and the gardai. Ambo was less than 10 mins, gardai took an hour and a half. Had to tell them I worked for the brigade to get their attention.