Re: Road Safety--Long story

January 26, 2008

Dudley,

This won't answer your question, but it will, perhaps add some zing to it.

In the last 3-4 days two medics have been killed in the US when run into by

oncoming traffic at a working MVC scene.

A week ago tonight, while I was driving home after dark I came upon a MVC on

the road near my house. The road is curvy and up and down little hills, with

plenty of blind curves and hills.

The speed limit is 35 with 25 recommended on several of the curves. Lots of

traffic starts up the hill and are going 50-60 by the time they get to the 25

mph blind curve where the accident was completely blocking the road. You

can see the gouges in the dirt where folks have left the pavement and gone to

gravel because they were going too fast. It seems that a car had been doing

60-70 and headoned two more cars on that curve. There was a fatality and 4

criticals transported, from what I could hear on my scanner.

There were from what I could see, 4 ambulances, a rescue, an engine, and at

least 2-3 sheriff's cars on scene when I drove up. There was no way past the

wreckage, and it was just around a corner, so you had maybe 25 yards to stop

once you could see the twinklies.

There was nobody doing traffic control except two young women who had come

along and were trying to stop and turn traffic around. They were standing in

the dark. I asked them if they were cops or FFs or what. They were just

nice ladies trying to help. They had never directed traffic before.

So, seeing no law enforcement anywhere but up on the scene, I parked my car

at an angle so the women and I would be illuminated but oncoming traffic would

not be blinded, got out my reflective vest, my flashlight, and for the next

45+ minutes handled traffic at the scene. Two more sheriff's cars passed me

and went to the scene, and one motor officer blasted past me also. Not one of

them stopped. Only about 50 minutes after I got onscene did one of the cops

come back to where we were and said, " Thanks, guys. I'll take it from here. "

I have no idea what he had been doing prior to that time, but I suspect he

had been standing and watching the extrication.

I suggested that, because there was a steady stream of traffic coming at us

at 40-50 mph, some of them I had to almost jump out of the way of since they

showed no signs of stopping, that the street should be shut down at the

intersection, since all the cars were having to be U-turned to go back there and

the

cops were going to be there for a LONG time. Hint: The first wrecker on

scene was turned around and sent on his way.

He didn't say anything in response, but stepped out and began to U-turn the

traffic.

I was disgusted but just said, " Hey, have a good one, " got in my car and

left.

I can say without too much fear of contradiction that the ladies and I

probably kept another crash or two from happening because as fast as some of

those

idiots were going, they would have had hell stopping before they impacted one

of the ambulances, which were parked in the middle of the road.

I am no rookie at traffic control Been there, done that, got the T, the

Mug, the Gimmie Cap, the Plaque, and the Thank You Letter. But I have seldom

felt as vulnerable as I did last Saturday night, and there was no need for it.

There was no incident command that I could see; otherwise how could the two

nice ladies and I have been left there to keep traffic off the responders? I

am pretty good at body judo and giving clear signals, but this was a bad

situation. The street needed to be shut down at the nearest intersection, but I

couldn't do that, I felt, because of lack of authority and lack of emergency

lighting, and so forth.

There were the usual idiots who didn't want to stop, one girl who got to

within 2 feet of me before she stopped, and I said, " Why didn't you stop? " She

said, " I didn't know what to do. " Another guy said, " What's your authority? "

I said, " None. Turn around. " He said, " I " m going to be late for the Mozart

Concert at the Jewish Community Center and I need to get by. " I said, " OK,

good luck, go slow. " In a minute I saw him turning around and coming back.

I must confess that I stood in front of him for a good 5 minutes before I

stopped the U-turns and let him go. I'm an evil old man.

I wrote a personal letter to the Sheriff of Pima County and to the President

of the Deputies Association pointing out to them, nicely, what had happened

and why I hoped that this was an unusual situation and not typical of their

practices. I have not heard back, and I don't expect to.

This stuff happens all the time here. Flares are seemingly an unknown item.

The concept of iron in the road sufficiently far ahead to absorb the crash

and give the scene workers a little protection and time--apparently unknown.

Blocking at an intersection? Unknown.

So I will be eager to hear what you do to secure your scenes as well as The

Dudman.

There are too many public safety responders killed in secondary crashed at

scenes of MVC.

We have the brains and the knowhow to minimize it if not stop it, but who is

doing anything about it?

Why do we read about deaths every week from secondary crashes?

Gene Gandy, JD, LP

Sometime Traffic Control Nazi

>

> Got a question for y'all. What are/do you or your agency do to increase the

> safety of you and your fellow responders while on scenes on active roadways.?

> What do you try to do, what is required, and what suggestions do you have to

> make it safer??

>

> Thanks.

>

> Dudley

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January 27, 2008

Here in our small town where we have a small department and 1-2 police officers

on duty and 1 sheriff's deputy on duty, traffic control is difficult here.

On my shift I make sure the apparatus is at an angle protecting me and my guys,

and if we get volunteers to come in a second truck I try and have them park 100

yards or so away and set up cones but they usually pull up as close as they can

to keep from walking far.

We're lucky though, that we can get ahold of TxDOT and they will usually show up

within 15min and close the whole road (PD/SO will also if they're free) but

we're usually stuck with no traffic control or volunteers doing it.

We just recently purchased ANSI II vests for every seat belt in every truck

(thanks to me), and we have STOP/SLOW paddles in most trucks, and 15-20 traffic

cones.

We cover 1,076 square miles with Texas 377, 87, 71, 283 all coming through the

county with a handful of large, long, hilly FM roads and our county roads are

HORRIBLE, muddy, 1 1/2 lanes, hope you don't have to turn around types.

We don't have chevron stripes on our trucks and an arrow stick on only one (the

truck I try and get to park 100yards or so down the road)

Garrett " Red "

Lt./EMT

Brady FD

Brady, TX.