As some of you know, I am a voluenteer fire fighter. This means I don't get paid for what I do, but it doesn't mean what I do is any less important than paid firefighters. (this is to clarify my reason for being very annoyed)

On sunday, I was on the flyer. This is our first response vehicle. It is manned 24/7, and if there is a firecall anywhere, the flyer is automatically responded (sent there with lights and sirens going.. ie an emergency).

Around 4:20 the fireline rings and we stand up and move out towards the truck. Shortly afterwards, we are instructed to respond to a nursing home fire alarm. This is not a good thing.

The flyer is based at HQ, which is off a main two lane a side road. Its fairly busy at times. We get out onto this road via a side road.

So we hit the sirens and lights and then get to the intersection. Despite being on a straight section of the road, where you can see almost 500 metres... people ignored us! I could not believe it!
Could someone tell please, how the hell you could miss this truck?!

Honestly people.. what do you think we are doing? Going to lunch? It is something that really annoys the hell out of me.
Fair enough some people could not stop. Thats fine. In fact I would rather they didn't so that they get out of our way quicker. But the people behind them certainly could've. But did they?

Fortunatly, the fire was just a false alarm. But it could've been a real fire, and those people who held us up for 20 or 30 seconds could have had their stupid actions contriubute towards the death of someone.

I know that when I'm driving with music playing, it's tough to hear the sirens.

I used to make the jaws of life.

Nice truck.

I saw a couple of grannies drive in front of a firetruck a while back and almost get t-boned.

Are you guys allowed to drive on the sidewalk? That's where it's at you know, no point driving anything with flashing lights if you can't go on the sidewalk.

In which case your music is too loud, you should always ensure you can hear the various noises of traffic when driving. Hearing is your 2nd most essential sense when driving afterall.

QFT and...

Here

Everytime I see an ambulance, people just stand there. Sure, some move out fo the way but others just stay there. This one time there was a guy with an ambulance at his tail and he STOPS at the red light. They should really arrest people for that stuff.

I hate that too...but I think you guys need louder sirens sometimes. I had an ambulance come right up behind me once before I noticed it. I got right out of the way, but I felt like an ***...but I didn't hear the siren until it was like 50ft away.

And before you blame my stereo...my car stereo has been broken for over a year.

There is absolutely no excuse for listening to music that loud when driving.

You should be checking your rearview/side mirrors more often then, no excuse really.

Regardless of whether you can hear the siren or not, flashing lights in my mirrors should catch your attention.

Why was the light red? If it was, it was the fault of the paramedics for not changing it.

I'm designing door mounted sidewinder missle rails to put on fire trucks just for this kind of thing.

Shouldn't these emergency vehicles write down the licences of problematic car drivers? Is there a policy like that?

What exactly is the official policy on what you do when emergency vehicles come around? Do you pull over to the left, or right, or just stop, or speed up? I know there's some different policies on this in European countries, and this caused great confusion.

In the US you're supposed to either pull off to the right side of the road, or pull over into the right lane. Basically, just get out of the trucks effing way.

If they're in your mirrors I don't see why they would catch MY attention. :p

i strongly disagree with that statement, if it was so damn important to hear i wouldn't be damn driving my car.

Quiet. It was early.

...so he should have broken the law and risked being hit by perpendicular traffic?

I wouldn't say hearing is the second most important sense when driving anyway. Consider driving without feeling (which would affect more than your sense of touch)!

Whats even worse than people failing to yield the right of way to ambulences, firetrucks, and police cars with their sirens on, is people who fail to stop for a stopped school bus with its lights flashing.

i see all kinds of idiots do stupid things when an emergency vehicle is coming.
i once heard the attendant in the ambulance yelling over the loud speaker at drivers who weren't stopping as the ambulance tried to make it's way from the left shoulder to the right shoulder of a 4 lane freeway. we were all doing 15kph and people kept driving through in front of the ambulance. so i made myself real wide accross 2 of the lanes and stopped dead so they could go accross.

I don't have my music that loud. I can have a conversation with the person it the passenger seat without shouting. There is just so much city noise, other cars, conmstruction, etc, that the sirens are dorwned out until the are only a few hundred feet away.

Haha, that's awsome. I would've done the same thing, it's so much fun to piss off idiots/***holes.

I believe you are allowed to edge slowly out into the traffic. Of course, you can't always do this.

I listen to my music loud, to drown out the sound of the world around me. My music requires a certain amount of volume for the bass to kick in, but I'm not one of those people that have one of those disrespectful stereo systems that blow out the windows of their neighbors.. However, I've never had a problem hearing or seeing emergency vehicles.