WASHINGTON, D. C. (Wednesday, March 7, 2018) ––At least 11 persons were killed, including two ambulance drivers, and 53 persons were injured in crashes involving emergency vehicles responding to a call  or otherwise on duty in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia from 2010 to February 2018, according to an analysis by AAA Mid-Atlantic. Those injured include at least 15 Emergency Medical Services (EMS) personnel, six police officers and two fire fighters. Just last week, an ambulance carrying a patient was involved in a violent crash with a tanker truck on U.S. 17 in Stafford. The crash left the patient and three EMS personnel injured. It is a sobering reminder that even in a town where presidential motorcades are seemingly an everyday occurrence, many area drivers are immune to the flashing lights and blaring sirens of emergency vehicles. Other motorists say although they hear the sirens, they are confused about which direction the sound is coming from, when it’s mixed with spatial traffic noise. For many, it all has become “background noise.”

That can happen on rural routes and on avenues in the District, where the city’s emergency vehicle fleet is dispatched to 852,122 emergency or non-emergency incidents per year. In most instances, emergency responders blare their sirens and flash their lights en route to 2,334 runs per day, on average. Drivers, pedestrians and cyclists need to respect and heed emergency vehicles. As is the case in cities and in the country, regular 100/200-watt siren warning signals often fail to capture the attention of motorists. Drivers are often either “fully occupied maneuvering their vehicles through traffic” or preoccupied with their electronic devices, including earbuds or AirPods. On top of that, today’s automotive fleet is equipped with “library-like” cabins or engineered with “noise-canceling technology” designed to reduce “outside noise to a minimum.”

Yet “crashes involving emergency vehicles, including ambulances, fire trucks, and police cars, are a substantial problem nationwide,” as research shows. Close to half of all collisions with emergency vehicles occur at intersections in the USA. It also occurs in intersections in the metro area while someone is being transported to hospitals. Metropolitan Police Department squad cars were involved in 931 crashes in 2015, a ten percent reduction from the previous year, 798 vehicular crashes in 2016, and 125 accidents in the first two months of 2017, although the reports did not enumerate the number of crashes during emergency runs.

“Once a call comes to 911, the actions, inactions, and reactions of just one motorist in traffic can delay emergency response times when life hangs in the balance. It is an age-old problem, and it might be getting worse as congestion increases on area roadways and everyone seems to be wearing ear buds or glancing down at their phones,” said John B. Townsend II, AAA Mid-Atlantic’s Manager of Public and Government Affairs. “Compounding matters, today’s stock of vehicles, especially Sphinx-like luxury vehicles, are so well insulated and sound-proofed that they block out road noises, including the alarm bells of emergency vehicles.” 

From 2010 to February 2018, at least ten persons, were killed in traffic crashes involving ambulances

across the region, including three in a head-on collision in Maryland, a patient in Virginia and a vehicle occupant in the District. Plus, 37 other persons were injured in traffic crashes involving ambulances, calculates AAA Mid-Atlantic. During the same period, one pedestrian was killed after being struck by a police vehicle, and 12 persons were injured in crashes involving police cruisers in traffic conditions in the region, AAA Mid-Atlantic tabulates. This tragic tally does not include an ever larger number of emergency responders or civilians struck, killed or injured while stopped on the side of a highway by passing vehicles.  For example, an FBI agent and a Maryland Fire Marshall, both off-duty, were killed while standing on the shoulder of I-270 at the scene of a crash in December. Nationwide, more than 100 persons are killed in traffic crashes involving emergency vehicles annually, warns the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

·         As many as 68 percent of crashes involving emergency vehicles “occurred with lights and sirens operating,” previous studies showed. Factors included “limited visibility” at intersections, with “many vehicles converging at once.”

·         Fire trucks were involved in 31,600 crashes over a 10 year period from 2000 to 2009, with nearly 70 percent of the crashes occurring while the fire truck was in emergency uses, notes the United States Fire Association (USFA).

·         Ground ambulances were involved in an average of 4,500 motor vehicle crashes annually during the 20-year period from 1992 to 2012, according to NHTSA data.

·          During that period, the nation witnessed an annual average of “29 fatal ambulance crashes” that resulted in “33 fatalities” per year, reports NHTSA.

·          Almost six in ten, 58 percent,  of fatal motor vehicle crashes involving ground ambulances annually occurred while the ambulance was in emergency use, and the remaining 42 percent transpired while the ambulance was in “non-emergency use.”

·         Ambulances were all involved in “1,500 injury crashes” per year, resulting “2,600 injured persons” annually, reports NHTSA.

·         Of all vehicles involved annually, that fatal tally includes “occupants of other vehicles (63 percent); ambulance passengers (21 percent); non-occupants (12 percent); and ambulance drivers (4 percent).”

Responsible for combating fires and responding to emergency medical incidents and 911 calls, the District Fire and Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Department’s emergency apparatus fleet sounded its sirens almost 700 times a per day on average, or a “minimum of 250,000 times in 2015,”  according to news reports. Nationwide, “fire truck crashes occur at a rate of 30,000 crashes a year.” When sirens and air horns sound, motorists should scan intersections or roadways for oncoming emergency vehicles, slow down, stop, and yield the right of way to emergency vehicles before entering the intersection or traveling the traffic lane.

Even Google’s self-driving cars are equipped with sensors and software to process the sirens of

emergency vehicles. The system causes the self-driving car to slow down or avoid entering an intersection until it has a “better sense of where the sirens are coming from.” Google says “our vehicle detects the sirens of an ambulance and yields at the intersection, allowing the emergency vehicle to pass through safely.” Unlike autonomous vehicles, some drivers panic or freeze when a fire truck, a police car or an ambulance is nearby.  Here are some rules of the road to follow when you are on the road and encounter an emergency vehicle.

·         Don’t panic when overtaken by emergency vehicles or disregard their presence by continuing to drive.

·         Pull to the right and come to a complete stop. If you are traveling on a high-speed road or in there is no room to stop, slow down as much as possible.

·         Don’t play your radio so loudly that you are unable to hear sirens. Radio or stereo systems should be set at a level that allows sirens or horns to be heard.

·         Cellular phone users should concentrate on safely operating the vehicle and maintain an awareness of their surroundings.

·         If you are in the left lane, pull over into the right lane as traffic in the lane to your right moves over.

·         On a four-lane highway or street without barriers, both sides of traffic should pull to the right.

·         When an emergency vehicle approaches you from behind while you are stopped at an intersection, stay where you are unless you can pull to the right.

·         When windows are closed, drivers should remain alert for flashing lights by looking in their rearview mirrors. Drivers should stay at least 500 feet behind emergency vehicles.

·         Be careful when driving by or around a motor vehicle accident or any situation where emergency vehicles are parked and the firefighters are working.

Day and night, densely populated urban centers and places, such as the Washington metro area, are filled with sights of flashing lights and “the long wail of a fire truck and the short shrills of an ambulance.”  The sirens are usually heard before the emergency vehicle is in view. Instead of pulling over to the right as much as possible and letting the emergency vehicle pass, some drivers keep right on driving, sometimes into harm’s way or the path of an emergency vehicle. It could be the cacophony of traffic or road noise or the din of the city, or the racket from their vehicle’s sound system that prevents some drivers from distinguishing emergency sirens. Most sirens have an “oscillating tone usually in a range within 1-3 kHz. Our ears are at their most sensitive at around 2kHz,” experts say. Yet “acoustic glass and advanced sound-deadening materials” in newer vehicle models and makes can shut out outside noise, including the distant scream of sirens.

“Even with the use of warning devices, intersections pose a serious threat to the safety of both emergency service personnel and the general public,” emergency responders warn. To combat this and get the attention of distracted and impervious drivers, emergency vehicles are turning up the volume. Along with the traditional siren, patrol cars in the Metropolitan Police Department’s squad fleet have been equipped for years with a “high-tech blaster” dubbed the “Rumbler.” Used to clear a path through traffic and intersections for police cruisers, it does just that with its “output woofer” and super-sized amplifiers.  Unlike typical emergency vehicle warning systems, “Rumbler sirens” reportedly can be heard and “felt from about 200 feet away.”

            With “sirens screaming down neon-lighted streets” drivers are required by the law to do all they can to

Allow the emergency vehicle to pass. It is so basic a rule of the road that it is on your driver’s license test.  For example, “pulling to the left gives the ambulance more room and slowing down shortens the ‘time exposed to danger,’ i.e. the time it takes to overtake you.” It is often hard to hear sirens over ambient noises and the cacophony of traffic. “Crashes occurring during emergency responses were more likely to occur near intersections or driveways, under dark lighting conditions, and during the PM peak period and the most prevalent types of crashes were angle, head-on, and sideswipe collisions,” research shows.

The law lays it down, drivers must yield the right-of-way to an emergency vehicle, and failure to do so can cause serious crashes or delays in ambulances, fire engines and fire trucks arriving at the scene of an emergency. Although emergency vehicles change the siren cadence 200 feet or so from the intersection, some drivers don’t hear or simply ignore emergency vehicles rushing to the scene of a life or death situation. For example, Virginia law requires drivers to pull over to the edge of the road, and to stop, when an emergency vehicle is approaching from an opposite direction on an undivided highway until the emergency vehicle passes. In Maryland, if an emergency vehicle is approaching from an opposite direction with audible and visual signals sounding and flashing, motorists must stop and remain stopped until the emergency vehicle has safely passed your vehicle. Maryland law also requires all drivers to yield the right of way to such emergency vehicles, unless otherwise instructed or directed by a police officer.

Emergency responders in Stockholm, Sweden are reportedly piloting a siren system that interrupts the radio, Bluetooth or CDs drivers are listening to and broadcasts a voice warning that an emergency vehicle is heading in their direction. “The signal is sent over the FM band along with the transmission of a text message that appears in the tuner display,” according to KTH Royal Institute of Technology.  What is more, wearing earbuds or headphones while driving can reduce your sensory deprivation and cognitive distraction level and prevent you from hearing the shrieks of the sirens of approaching fire trucks, fast-moving ambulances, police cruisers, or other emergency vehicles coming in your direction. Even so, motorists also should always observe “the move over law” when law enforcement or emergency vehicles are on the side of the road. This is the law in all 50 states, including Maryland and Virginia. However, the District of Columbia has no move over law.

Follow us on Twitter: @AAADCNews

Like us on Facebook: AAA Mid-Atlantic News

Washington, D.C. Mailing Address:
1405 G Street NW
Washington, DC 20005

AAA provides automotive, travel and insurance services to 57 million members nationwide and nearly 78,000 members in the District of Columbia.  AAA advocates for the safety and mobility of its members and has been committed to outstanding road service for more than 100 years.  The not-for-profit, fully tax-paying member organization works on behalf of motorists, who can now map a route, find local gas prices, discover discounts, book a hotel and track their roadside assistance service with the AAA Mobile app for iPhone, iPad and Android. For more information, visit  https://aaa.com