My girlfriend was involved in a crash the other day, driving home from college on a bad road, saw flashing lights coming around the corner, next thing she knew an ambulance was coming around on her side of the road!! Head on colision! :|

Somehow no-one got hurt, both think they were goin about 40mph, both a write off. Dont know how she wasnt hurt, cos the ambulance was massive an only a lil corsa so well done vauxhall could of been alot worse.

Pretty shocking to be fair, certainly made me think about things differently.

It got a guiness world record, quickest time for an ambulance to get to the scene :P

Worst of all there was a patient in the back with a suspected heart attack!!!

Glad everyone is ok - sounds like a bad one.

oh dear

ye thankfully everyone was ok, bit bruised an acheing tho, bit of a miracle really, il try to get the pics, cant recognise her corsa now, flat at the front.

Verrrry lucky there.

Glad everyone is o.k.

...does make you think, but as said, glad everyone is alright

thats like a lorry having a head on with a mini not good

i know, thats why she was soooo lucky to walk off from it, amazin, corsa has gone up in my books ha

I'm surprised the police haven't been involved - just because this is an ambulance it doesn't excuse dangerous driving. I'd have my insurance company claim every bit of damage possible and frankly I'd have the driver of the ambulance up on a dangerous driving claim with the police. From the sounds of it, the only thing that saved your girlfriend's life was luck.

It annoys me that the emergency services seem to feel the rules don't apply to them. there has recently been a case where a cop has been done for dangerous driving during a training execise where he killed someone. I don't care if they're trying to save someones's life - doesn't excuse taking another!

s**te thats crap hope she is OK and does not have flashbacks....as above sounds like a case of dangerous driving for the Police.............I know we people are not normally Vauxhall fans but 1 saved my life when I was 18 and sounds like the Corsa has done the same here

Without actually witnessing, or having more info I don't really want to comment on 'dangerous driving' etc. but;

1) These people are highly trained to make decisions on what is safe
2) They see the consequences of accidents so are not going to drive unsafely for the sake of it
3) They generally do an excellent job, but do have to take extra risks sometimes

There may have been a third party (such as an animal) that dictated the direction of the ambulance, either actively (collision) or passively (swerve to avoid).
Perhaps they never saw the Corsa, and proceeded on the genuine misaprension that the road was clear - presumably the Corsa did not see the Fluorescent Van with blue flashing lights!

I'm just playing devil's advocate here, but I do feel that we are being a bit quick to condemn.

Quote:

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It annoys me that the emergency services seem to feel the rules don't apply to them. there has recently been a case where a cop has been done for dangerous driving during a training execise where he killed someone. I don't care if they're trying to save someones's life - doesn't excuse taking another!

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The biggest issue is not the emergency vehicles, but the other road users. All you need to do is watch Traffic Cops to see how ignorant 90% of drivers are to what is happening around them. Think of how many blue light runs happen every day, and how many accidents happen - these drivers do an excellent job, and should be allowed to make the odd mistake without being viewed as "dangerous" or "wreckless".

• If you are a secretery, have you never pressed the wrong key on a keyboard?
  
• If you are a receptionist have you never mis-directed a call?
  
• If you are a programmer have you never missed out parenthesis?
  
• If you empty bins have you never returned a bin not 100% empty, or even missed one out?
  
• If you work in a bar, have you never poured the wrong pint?
  

We all make mistakes, it just happens that when they (rarely) do, they are more serious - but then what do you expect?

lol, gone a bit mental since i last left it...

The driver has been driving ambulances for 30 years, he said he has never known anythin like it, said the back end went out, there is a tree on the corner, so we think there could of been leaves on the road.

She did see it coming around the corner, well the lights anyway, so she started breaking then, but not alot you can do when it appears on your side of the road :O

She got a hire car now from the ambulance's insurance so she's at home looking at cars now hehe

I guess there are 2 ways of looking at this. I live by an ambulance station & quite regularly see ambulances around in queing traffic. This forces the ambulance to go on opposite side of road where they have no view of what is round the corner & vica versa. I assume that they think cars will see them and move, now if you are coming the other way too quickly (25-30mph may be too quickly) and have a vehicle appear infront of you, you may not be able to prevent a colision.

This is not the same as the accident circumstances but brings me to the same point. If you or a loved one was in need of help or in this case needed to get to hospital asap would you want the ambulence to overtake traffic/ go slightly quicker than conditions dictate or would you like it to wait in traffic or slow down. It is quite an emotive subject and I expect that while they remain profesional, the human life/death aspect does drive emergency services (no punn intended) to take more risks.


Now, if I digress for a minute, I also witness a disregard for fellow drivers from emergency services. Quite often I see 'them' (collective emergency services) charge up to traffic without sirens - why dont they use them and give us a few seconds extra warning? But the biggy was while heading back home one night. Lights on red, ambulance infront - puts lights on goes through lights - lights change to green, I head in same direction, ambulence in distance (no lights) - follow to next set of lights - ambulance goes round corner & into ambulance station.

I guess you're always going to get some people with a god complex but to sum up, I do believe ambulance drivers on the whole are just trying to do the best for their patients.

Glad to hear everybody was ok after the accident