“Lights + Siren = Pull Over And Stop”

A video of Toronto EMS transporting a shooting victim to Sunnybrook Hospital. This is why people should pay attention when they drive... Lights and siren means an emergency vehicle is approaching, so get ready to stop and give way, it does not mean speed up and try to beat the ambulance!

Granted, the law says the ambulance has to come to a full and complete stop before proceeding. However, all other motorists on Lawrence Avenue (the cross-street) had stopped, the siren was blaring, he did reduce his speed significantly. Usually sirens + cars in adjacent lane stopped ahead = emergency vehicle going through intersection. Even if he had brought the ambulance to a full stop, there still would've been a crash... sad thing is... the ambulance driver probably got charged.

Radar Identified wrote:sad thing is... the ambulance driver probably got charged.

What RI meant to say was the "driver of the ambulance", not the ambulance driver. They've gone the way of dinosaurs and the dodo bird! Althought I know what you mean, I'm anal about that.

Truth is we rarely come to a full and complete stop at red lights and stop signs, unless of course traffic is heavy, a clear view of cross-traffic is unavailable, etc... Otherwise, we simply slow down, make sure the way is clear and away we go. This isin't because we're irresponsible, yielding is usually sufficiant. I will yield with minor cross streets, and usually crawl at major, multiple lane intersections. As you said, RI, it seems that this collision would have occured since that car was probably hidden from the driver's vantage point.

One advantage that EMS, Police, and Fire have is that if we are on our way to an emergency call at the time of the collision, (along with a patient on board returning from a call in the case of EMS), all HTA charges cannot be used against us by our insurance company to raise the premiums for our personal vehicles. After all, how many of us would actually go through a red light with our own cars? Althought we are not legally obliged to speed, go through reds, ect, we do because it is expected of us.

BTW, Lights+Siren = slam on brakes, stop in inside lane, pull over in front of me as I pass you in the centre turning lane, and so on. At the waaaaaayyyyy bottom of the list one will find pull right and stop!

ditchMD wrote:BTW, Lights+Siren = slam on brakes, stop in inside lane, pull over in front of me as I pass you in the centre turning lane, and so on. At the waaaaaayyyyy bottom of the list one will find pull right and stop!

Yeah, I know... The title of the thread is what drivers are supposed to do, but rarely do it. I've seen the absolute dumbest reactions to emergency vehicles since I moved here... and I'm not even a first responder (police, firefighter, EMS).

Knowing what to do when an emergency vehicle approaches is such a basic aspect of driving, that it speaks volumes about our lack of driving standards and training when we look at how people actually react in those situations.