SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — Two crashes involving law enforcement this week are highlighting the importance of slowing down and moving over for emergency vehicles.
Tuesday, there were two crashes in South Dakota involving law enforcement vehicles: one in Union County and the other in Jackson County.
“Unfortunately, these types of accidents with law enforcement vehicles do occur. They’ve happened here in the county over the last several years,” Minnehaha County Sheriff’s Office patrol captain Adam Zishka said.
It serves as a reminder to slow down and move over for any vehicle using flashing lights.
As part of the Move Over Law, drivers are required to move over or slow down when a vehicle is using blue, yellow or amber warning lights. If they don’t, they could be hit with a $270 fine.
“A lot of the time the lights indicate something else is going on, so whether it’s DOT picking up litter or a tow vehicle towing another vehicle, there’s things happening in front of those lights that you may not be able to see until it’s too late. That’s why it’s incredibly important to slow down or move over,” Zishka said.
The dangers of working on the side of the road is not lost on tow truck drivers at Jim & Ron’s.
“If you think about it, you’re on the side of the road, standing still, and there’s traffic coming at you at 80 miles an hour, and you’re three feet away from that traffic that’s moving 80 miles an hour,” Jim and Ron’s owner Paul Giese said.
Which forces them to take precautions.
“We do everything we can from the lights that we have on our trucks to the reflective gear, obviously training to let them understand that you never take an eye off the road. We have special equipment for our trucks that we can and turn on our lights to inform anybody that’s using a navigation system that there’s a traffic incident ahead,” Giese said.
But preventing the next accident is simple.
“Don’t be in such a hurry. Stay safe. Get there a couple of minutes late versus not at all,” Giese said.
If you don’t follow the Move Over Law, you could also be sentenced to thirty days in jail.
