Ambulance and Traffic Signals

Seeing an ambulance waiting at a traffic signal with its siren blaring is something that pains my heart. How I wish something was done about it! Why can’t the vehicles coming from the opposite side stop and give way for the ambulance? (I know it is easier said than done) Is it a must to follow the signal when a person’s life is at stake? Can’t the police do anything about it? I remember waiting at the signal at the Mount Road-Venkatanarayana Road junction once when an ambulance, inside which was sitting a lady crying with a baby in her arms, was waiting for the signal to turn green for some 10 minutes! Agreed it was peak hour and the traffic was heavy. But, couldn’t something have been done about it? Yesterday too I saw an ambulance waiting for some 5 minutes at a signal. It is at moments like these that I feel so damn helpless! 

11 thoughts on “Ambulance and Traffic Signals

  1. Hell's Angel

    pathetic to hear!!but strange 2 hear nobody had paved way!! i remember once while going in car an ambulance kept honking 4m behind and i paved way for it & i felt too proud @ tht time!!!

    & guess wat once @ luz church road i saw an ambulance going..since the left side of the road was filled with vehicles waiting 4 the signal, it took the right side of the road.. using this as a chance some commuters went behind the ambulance to escape the signal..shameless!!!

    Reply
  2. T.U. Dinesh

    the traffic police do their best to keep an ambulance with siren moving, it is the general public who act indifferent …

    here is an unrelated paragraph but its a lesser known info :
    the apollo ambulance drivers are made shuttle patients from greams rd hospital to teynampet hospital at times and have a time limit of 11 mins i guess before which they should make sure the patient is transferred form one branch to another … this puts the drivers under pressure …

    all these pressures on the drivers makes ambulance one of the most rashly driven vehicle … at times the shakes of the vehicles and the bumps it runs over results in increasing the patients trauma … but the service of these drivers always goes unnoticed, which has to be promplty acknowledged

    Reply
  3. Sathej

    Again,it is the people’s indifference coupled with poor traffic system to blame.Both the Traffic Police and the public have to remember that every minute is precious to the patient.
    Sathej

    Reply
  4. Mathangi

    this happens very often in gemini signal. even if the siren is blaring behind, the driver acts as though he’s deaf. doesn’t even put an effort to move. horrible! i sometimes feel ppl jus lock their hearts!sick!

    Reply
  5. ranjhith

    Looks like an Emergency gets jammed in Traffic. No shouldn’t be! What we need is a White signal in addition to Red, Green & Yellow to ease the emergency. All traffic should steer themselves to the right, paving way for the flow of Ambulances, Rapid Action Forces, Fire Tenders, …
    I’ll take this idea to http://ideaxtream.pbwiki.com 🙂

    ps: Aparna, If I could edit this post, I would add some line breaks. >:O)

    Reply
  6. Aparna

    Hell’s Angel,
    namba janangaLa thirutthave mudiyaadhu!

    Dinesh,
    I din’t know about that. And yeah, the drivers’ service has to be acknowledged!

    Sathej,
    Exactly!

    Mathangi,
    hmmm

    Reply
  7. Aparna

    Ranjhith,
    When I read that what we need is a white signal, I thought you should be writing it under your Ideaxtream category & you had written the same thing! 🙂 Btw, it seems you are getting many brilliant ideas nowadays from other people’s posts 🙂

    Yuva,
    Alright we will be more responsible from the next time.

    Reply
  8. Pingback: White Signal « th?attle

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