Crash on M60 Manchester, overkill on emergency vehicles
Discussion
Yesterday we spent a good two hours in traffic on the M60 due to a crash. Now during this time we witnessed , overtaking us using the hard shoulder , six ambulances four fire engines five police cars, a black BMW no markings but blue lights , oh and three paramedics cars.
So in total 19 emergency vehicles, might have missed some, that were legging it on the other carriage way. We were expecting a major crash site, several vehicles or even a plane crash.
Nope, a ford Ka facing the wrong way in the outside lane being protected by one of those motorway trucks with the large flashing arrow, it looked like a truck had spun him round as a twenty ton truck was parked on the hard shoulder a few hundred feet further on.
It just seemed a bit over the top, is this usual as recently chap fell off his motor cycle near where I live, and I do mean fell off as he negotiated a tight bend at walking speed, six emergency vehicles turned up for that one.
No traffic officers, thankfully so we kept moving all be it slowly !
So in total 19 emergency vehicles, might have missed some, that were legging it on the other carriage way. We were expecting a major crash site, several vehicles or even a plane crash.
Nope, a ford Ka facing the wrong way in the outside lane being protected by one of those motorway trucks with the large flashing arrow, it looked like a truck had spun him round as a twenty ton truck was parked on the hard shoulder a few hundred feet further on.
It just seemed a bit over the top, is this usual as recently chap fell off his motor cycle near where I live, and I do mean fell off as he negotiated a tight bend at walking speed, six emergency vehicles turned up for that one.
No traffic officers, thankfully so we kept moving all be it slowly !
glad someone else has mentioned this.
i spend most of my working life on the motorway network, and have noticed in the last couple of years in the uk, that there seems to be far more emergency vehicles, than is probably required. why???
similar thing as mentioned, a 2 or 3 car shunt, not big damage, and nothing more than minor injuries, and yet, you get 4 or 5 fire engines, 2 too 4 ambulances, aswell as paramedic cars and a variety of police and hato cars on the scene, seems abit like overkill to me, and a massive waste of budget/resources.
i fully understand, that in a situation, its right for the emergency services to attend, but when a situation has been under control for 15 minutes, and yet more emergency vehicles are arriving, that then leave the scene, a minute or two later, its just abit daft, is there no way that these services can communicate with one another?
is there a reason that i'm missing, or is it like most other things now in the uk, where common sense and straight thinking, are a thing of the past, and the health and safety people and e.u nutcases control our world.
straight bananas, cheese cakes, (the stringy ones, that now can't be called cheese cakes, as they don't contain cheese, yeah right, no s
t sherlock) and so on it goes, yet at the same time, a convicted terrorist, gets out after serving 3 years here, of an 8 year sentence for his plots and crimes against us, and yet can't be deported, as the judge rules he'd be at risk, if sent back to his own country
are you sure, hang on, just gotta pop to the hole in the wall, need to lend greece another couple of billion euros, its ok, they've promised me they won't default....
i spend most of my working life on the motorway network, and have noticed in the last couple of years in the uk, that there seems to be far more emergency vehicles, than is probably required. why???
similar thing as mentioned, a 2 or 3 car shunt, not big damage, and nothing more than minor injuries, and yet, you get 4 or 5 fire engines, 2 too 4 ambulances, aswell as paramedic cars and a variety of police and hato cars on the scene, seems abit like overkill to me, and a massive waste of budget/resources.
i fully understand, that in a situation, its right for the emergency services to attend, but when a situation has been under control for 15 minutes, and yet more emergency vehicles are arriving, that then leave the scene, a minute or two later, its just abit daft, is there no way that these services can communicate with one another?
is there a reason that i'm missing, or is it like most other things now in the uk, where common sense and straight thinking, are a thing of the past, and the health and safety people and e.u nutcases control our world.
straight bananas, cheese cakes, (the stringy ones, that now can't be called cheese cakes, as they don't contain cheese, yeah right, no s
t sherlock) and so on it goes, yet at the same time, a convicted terrorist, gets out after serving 3 years here, of an 8 year sentence for his plots and crimes against us, and yet can't be deported, as the judge rules he'd be at risk, if sent back to his own countryare you sure, hang on, just gotta pop to the hole in the wall, need to lend greece another couple of billion euros, its ok, they've promised me they won't default....
Is it at all possible that stuff had happened before you got there. Maybe the truck that was parked up the road was blocking the road at some point, or the car was leaking fuel or the driver of one of the vehicles had a heat attack etc. Unless you think they waited until you'd passed a critical eye over the scene before getting on with their jobs.
EDLT said:
Is it at all possible that stuff had happened before you got there. Maybe the truck that was parked up the road was blocking the road at some point, or the car was leaking fuel or the driver of one of the vehicles had a heat attack etc. Unless you think they waited until you'd passed a critical eye over the scene before getting on with their jobs.
Yes that was it, my fault completely. EDLT said:
Is it at all possible that stuff had happened before you got there. Maybe the truck that was parked up the road was blocking the road at some point, or the car was leaking fuel or the driver of one of the vehicles had a heat attack etc. Unless you think they waited until you'd passed a critical eye over the scene before getting on with their jobs.
i agree this is possible, but we all know this is hardly the case most of the time.Perhaps there is also a bigger part in this and that is the fact that little shunts and spins can often turn into much bigger things very quickly when cars pile into the back of existing accidents. TBO, i'd rather they turned out en masse than have a couple turn up and have to make cricital decisions based on manpower rather than need. The more that are there, the more quickly things can be managed, organised and sorted. So the theory goes.....
What really irritates me is the UK police "On the wall" documentaries where you see footage of a squad cars driving like idiots (trained at great expense of course) to reach a "Shout". On arrival there's three other squad cars, an ambulance and a bloke with a broom sweeping up... Why risk "Blues and Two's" driving when there's already plenty of emergency service bod's there?
mrloudly said:
What really irritates me is the UK police "On the wall" documentaries where you see footage of a squad cars driving like idiots (trained at great expense of course) to reach a "Shout". On arrival there's three other squad cars, an ambulance and a bloke with a broom sweeping up... Why risk "Blues and Two's" driving when there's already plenty of emergency service bod's there?
So you thnk they should all drive slowly assuming someone else will get there first?I've lost a wheel on a busy single carriageway once. A police car saw me, made a u-turn and came to me to check is everything ok. It was, but he insisted to stay. Fair enough. He then called a traffic unit ( he wasn't one) which promptly arrived. The traffic cop told him that he's not necessary anymore but the guy made it very clear that he's just killing some time because his shift was boring so far. So there we were standing at the hard shoulder for 30mins.
It's nothing different to three police vans full of them attending to one drunken guy on my street. Total overkill.
But the biggest shock for me was seeing an accident in lane 3 of the autobahn being dealt with by German police. It was a 4 vehicle shunt, nobody was seriously injured but the vehicles had to be recovered, there was a lorry blocking lane 4 further up. They've only closed two middle lanes leaving lane 1 and 4 open and guess what - nobody died, traffic went slowly but at steady pace in lane 1 and 4. In the UK the motorway would be closed for 5 hours...
It's nothing different to three police vans full of them attending to one drunken guy on my street. Total overkill.
But the biggest shock for me was seeing an accident in lane 3 of the autobahn being dealt with by German police. It was a 4 vehicle shunt, nobody was seriously injured but the vehicles had to be recovered, there was a lorry blocking lane 4 further up. They've only closed two middle lanes leaving lane 1 and 4 open and guess what - nobody died, traffic went slowly but at steady pace in lane 1 and 4. In the UK the motorway would be closed for 5 hours...
chilistrucker said:
and the health and safety people and e.u nutcases control our world.
Nothing whatsoever to do with the EU - this is a purely British disease - and I fully agree with the OP (and not with the usual "better safe than sorry" bunch who slavishly brown-nose the rozzers).On of my best friends is Dutch and he works on big exhibitions (stuff like setting up flower shows for example) all over Europe. We were staying with them last weekend and he was saying that trying to get his job done in the UK is a total nightmare due to HSE - daft regs on ladders, "method statements" for sweeping the floor, TUV approved fixings that are good everywhere else not allowed here - his list was endless.
So don't blame the EU - the crackpots are home grown.
SWoll said:
mrloudly said:
What really irritates me is the UK police "On the wall" documentaries where you see footage of a squad cars driving like idiots (trained at great expense of course) to reach a "Shout". On arrival there's three other squad cars, an ambulance and a bloke with a broom sweeping up... Why risk "Blues and Two's" driving when there's already plenty of emergency service bod's there?
So you thnk they should all drive slowly assuming someone else will get there first?rottie102 said:
But the biggest shock for me was seeing an accident in lane 3 of the autobahn being dealt with by German police. It was a 4 vehicle shunt, nobody was seriously injured but the vehicles had to be recovered, there was a lorry blocking lane 4 further up. They've only closed two middle lanes leaving lane 1 and 4 open and guess what - nobody died, traffic went slowly but at steady pace in lane 1 and 4. In the UK the motorway would be closed for 5 hours...
I see this all the time in Germany, car smashed into a barrier or rolled onto its roof, with just one police chap/chapess waving cars on past.Something had occurred on the roundabout where the A1M meets the M25 at around 6:30pm last night. There was a car in the third lane with no appreciable damage, so I'm guessing it was broken down. However, it took two cop cars, two Womble cars, one of those lorries with the flashing arrows on, and enough cones to keep an entire university amused, to keep us all safe from ourselves. To make it worse, they had closed three lanes of a - let's be honest - rather busy four-lane roundabout, in order to winch said car onto the low-loader. Why wouldn't you just tow the bloody thing into lane 1 before getting busy with the winch?!
Yet, with all the above excesses in mind, why is it when I call the police and ask for a patrol to visit our crime ridden Ind Est occasionally I'm told "Sorry sir, we don't have the resources" ... I suppose those not attending a minor roundabout shunt are on long term sick/stress leave after the riots...
Dog Star said:
Nothing whatsoever to do with the EU - this is a purely British disease - and I fully agree with the OP (and not with the usual "better safe than sorry" bunch who slavishly brown-nose the rozzers).
On of my best friends is Dutch and he works on big exhibitions (stuff like setting up flower shows for example) all over Europe. We were staying with them last weekend and he was saying that trying to get his job done in the UK is a total nightmare due to HSE - daft regs on ladders, "method statements" for sweeping the floor, TUV approved fixings that are good everywhere else not allowed here - his list was endless.
So don't blame the EU - the crackpots are home grown.
I think you'll find it's our slave government being the only one to follow EU diktats to the letter.....On of my best friends is Dutch and he works on big exhibitions (stuff like setting up flower shows for example) all over Europe. We were staying with them last weekend and he was saying that trying to get his job done in the UK is a total nightmare due to HSE - daft regs on ladders, "method statements" for sweeping the floor, TUV approved fixings that are good everywhere else not allowed here - his list was endless.
So don't blame the EU - the crackpots are home grown.
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