Are police departments, ambulance districts, and fire departments held liable when somebody strikes their vehicles on the side of the road at an accident scene?

Most states, including Georgia have laws that mandate drivers yield to emergency vehicles (which typically includes tow trucks working accident scenes at the behest of law enforcement):

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Move Over Law: Georgia Code, Title 40-6-16.

A. The operator of a motor vehicle approaching a stationary authorized emergency vehicle that is displaying flashing yellow, amber, white, red, or blue lights shall approach the authorized emergency vehicle with due caution and shall, absent any other direction by a peace officer, proceed as follows:

1. Make a lane change into a lane not adjacent to the authorized emergency vehicle if possible in the existing safety and traffic conditions; or

2. If a lane change under paragraph (1) of this subsection would be impossible, prohibited by law, or unsafe, reduce the speed of the motor vehicle to a reasonable and proper speed for the existing road and traffic conditions, which speed shall be less than the posted speed limit, and be prepared to stop.

B. The operator of a motor vehicle approaching a stationary towing or recovery vehicle or a stationary highway maintenance vehicle that is displaying flashing yellow, amber, or red lights shall approach the vehicle with due caution and shall, absent any other direction by a peace officer, proceed as follows:

1. Make a lane change into a lane not adjacent to the towing, recovery, or highway maintenance vehicle if possible in the existing safety and traffic conditions; or

2. If a lane change under paragraph (1) of this subsection would be impossible, prohibited by law, or unsafe, reduce the speed of the motor vehicle to a reasonable and proper speed for the existing road and traffic conditions, which speed shall be less than the posted speed limit, and be prepared to stop.

C . Violation of subsection (a) or (b) of this Code section shall be punished by a fine of not more than $500.00.

When I was in the towing business years ago we were never allowed to make unilateral decisions at an accident scene. We needed permission from those responsible for the scene (usually LEOs) prior to touching anything, and prior to occupying any open lane of traffic. I would assume that the wrecker driver had a similar discussion and was where he was with their approval. Had that been me, I would have requested they have one of their police cars situated behind me to close the lane.

Roadside accidents are a leading cause of death for LEOs, medics, firefighters, and tow operators.

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Originally posted by trapper189:
She rear ended the vehicle in front of her, she's 100٪ at fault. Add to that, the vehicle she hit was a parked emergency vehicle and not only will she not see a dime, she'll be paying for her actions for a very long time.

I hope so but don't expect it.

My mother's close friend had her car just die in the middle lane of a 5 lane freeway. She couldn't get to the shoulder so she was stopped in the middle lane with her hazard flashers on. A trucker hit her at full speed because he was head down texting. Video showed he had a clear view of her for a half mile. The car burst into flames and she died.

Her husband sued the trucker and his employer but lost.

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Are police departments, ambulance districts, and fire departments held liable when somebody strikes their vehicles on the side of the road at an accident scene?

I would guess every state is different but as long as you have your emergency lights on here (Washington) the car that hits you is at fault. We carried road cones and placed them behind the vehicles to cut the lane off and give people time to move over. More than once I had my driver totally block all lanes too until we could determine what was going on. I'm retired now but I'm guessing things haven't changed.

My big deal with who is at fault here is from the one time I watched the video it seems the driver of the car had not even started to slow down as she approached the obvious accident.....

Driver 101...you see flashing lights on either side of the road slow the hell down....

Yeeeee Haaaawwwww....... let us try that again. ........ Time to get ready for the lawyers and the jury to place fault . ............................... drill sgt.

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Originally posted by Blume9mm:
My big deal with who is at fault here is from the one time I watched the video it seems the driver of the car had not even started to slow down as she approached the obvious accident.....

You don't get altitude by applying the brakes.

I wanna see this one on one of those Farmer's Insurance commercials.

I can’t believe I’m reading where people are trying to say this wasn’t visible or that the driver who flew is going to sue. Fuck her. I cannot count how many times in my driving life I’ve come across a car or truck just parked in the fast lane, most of the times hazards, many times not. Also debris, furniture just sitting on the highway in a lane. I mean so numerous over a driving life. I have even dodged someone driving the wrong direction on the highway two different times. The last one was 2016/2017 on the way back from Colorado. Son of a bitch was doing at least 80 mph. I saw it coming, swerved the 4X4 I was driving into the service road and slightly into the grass to avoid and it took extreme fast reaction time or we would have been hit. If I was not paying attention to the road ahead, that driver would have killed me and two ladies. We’d all have been DOA. I was doing 75 mph on a 75 mph highway. Two opposing vehicles traveling that speed and hitting head on it would have been a metal popsicle.

This lackadaisical attitude towards driving today with autonomous driving, distracted driving via eating, smartphone surfing and watching videos has equaled the worst driving, by a fair margin, that I have ever seen in my life, and the most dangerous. Fuck I pulled out of my neighborhood last night to go the gym and nearly got hit turning out of my own neighborhood. I was making a left onto a 3 lane in each direction road that is 40 mph. This lady was in the farthest lane so I had the two closer lanes to turn left into and chose the closest to give me a full lane gap to her. She uses no signal, and swerves across two lanes into mine jamming on her brakes. I punch it and barely avoid her. After I swerve and am safe I tap the brakes look over and she is holding the phone up talking on the speaker, clueless. Keep your eyes peeled.

That was pretty wild.

Man I do love the color scheme of those GSP cruisers!

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Originally posted by randyman:

All of this talk about distracted driver and failure to move over is pure BS! If you adjust the volume and increase the treble when watching the video, you can clearly hear the driver say "Hey - watch this!"

Hold my beer.

I saw no emergency lights on nothing, on that side of HWY,somebody is in deep shit if the driver gets a good attorney

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Originally posted by Prefontaine:
I can’t believe I’m reading where people are trying to say this wasn’t visible or that the driver who flew is going to sue. Fuck her...

Not just that she's going to sue, but that she's going win and get money. I'm literally laughing out loud at this idea and the reasons being put forth to support the idea. It's better than the Dad jokes and groaners thread. I don't see any attempt made on her part to not hit the tow truck before she goes suborbital. I suspect she'll get the book thrown at her when she recovers. I can't imagine a jury from Lowndes County or Brooks County, GA, which are just north of the Florida/Georgia State Line looking favorably on Florida Woman.

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Originally posted by Prefontaine:
I was making a left onto a 3 lane in each direction road that is 40 mph. This lady was in the farthest lane so I had the two closer lanes to turn left into

Physically, yes.

Legally, no*.

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and chose the closest to give me a full lane gap to her.

Which is not only smart, it's The Law*.

(*Unless your location has some variation on a fairly standard portion of the traffic code; each state is slightly different.)

Typically, if there is only one turn lane, you must turn into the closest lane in the direction of travel.



Only if there happened to be two left turn lanes at that intersection, and you were in the rightmost left turn lane, could you have legally turned into that middle lane. (At least in Arkansas, and other states with which I'm familiar.) But that type of multi-turn-lane setup is generally seen at a controlled intersection with a light, so approaching traffic isn't a concern.


Making a wide turn into a center or far lane when turning is one of the most common traffic violations out there.

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Originally posted by RogueJSK:

Well then what the hell is even the point of internet discussions if we can't jump to conclusions based on little to no information?!

()

A fair point.

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I saw no emergency lights on nothing,

Body worn camera resolution and frame rate isn't usually that great, especially when it comes to seeing things at any distance. Just because you don't see them on the body cam footage doesn't mean it's not there.

https://www.walb.com/2023/06/0...co-flying-car-crash/

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According to the incident report from the crash, the tow truck did have emergency lights on. That means it’s considered an emergency vehicle, so the Move Over Law would apply to other drivers on the road.

WALB asked if law enforcement vehicles or personnel should have been on that side of the highway to help.

“Usually yeah, we have other deputies there that could help out and assist depending on what they have going on. They’ll try to monitor and park their vehicle in certain places to monitor traffic,” Mejia said. “That vehicle is an emergency vehicle, and it had flashing lights on. So that should have definitely been a sign to slow down and move over.”