What the heck would you do?

[karunamayi]

Saturday night we were heading to our friend's place for dinner. We were driving up a crest that flattened out on an overpass of a major road.

*Just* as we're coming up with the flat (2 lane) road in view, a police car is barreling towards us, in OUR lane, heading STRAIGHT at us, with his lights and sirens going. He was overtaking cars in his lane by using our lane and he's MOVING. Kripa swerves to the right and he misses us by feet. Or yards... or however ya'll measure it. It was close.

My head kind of exploded and I grabbed Kripa's phone and called 911. Not sure WHAT I was doing, but it was happening none the less. Kripa being the ever-twit started to give me shit. "he knows what he's doing. He's in control of his car. Don't act like Debbie. (my x mIL)"

I got 911 on the phone and she put me through to the non emergence police dept bc, you know... it WASN'T an emergency.

They had me on hold until after we arrived at our destination, so I hung up and burst into tears. I was *SO* scared. he couldn't see us coming up the crest while he was in our lane. Had there been a car where he pulled back into his lane, we would have had a high speed head on collision.

All my car accident nuttyness came back and I suspect that was my over reaction.

So, I've mentioned it to a few people and I'll tell you, most of them had a very tragic high-speed-chase fatality story to tell me BECAUSE of the police car.

This is very dangerous.

I want to write the police dept a letter and complain. How many times are these guys getting all bent and high on adrenaline and making our little sojournes to dinner so unsafe?

[another shannon]

Saturday night we were heading to our friend's place for dinner. We were driving up a crest that flattened out on an overpass of a major road.

*Just* as we're coming up with the flat (2 lane) road in view, a police car is barreling towards us, in OUR lane, heading STRAIGHT at us, with his lights and sirens going. He was overtaking cars in his lane by using our lane and he's MOVING. Kripa swerves to the right and he misses us by feet. Or yards... or however ya'll measure it. It was close.

My head kind of exploded and I grabbed Kripa's phone and called 911. Not sure WHAT I was doing, but it was happening none the less. Kripa being the ever-twit started to give me shit. "he knows what he's doing. He's in control of his car. Don't act like Debbie. (my x mIL)"

I got 911 on the phone and she put me through to the non emergence police dept bc, you know... it WASN'T an emergency.

They had me on hold until after we arrived at our destination, so I hung up and burst into tears. I was *SO* scared. he couldn't see us coming up the crest while he was in our lane. Had there been a car where he pulled back into his lane, we would have had a high speed head on collision.

All my car accident nuttyness came back and I suspect that was my over reaction.

So, I've mentioned it to a few people and I'll tell you, most of them had a very tragic high-speed-chase fatality story to tell me BECAUSE of the police car.

This is very dangerous.

I want to write the police dept a letter and complain. How many times are these guys getting all bent and high on adrenaline and making our little sojournes to dinner so unsafe?

You mention you have "car accident nuttyness" and perhaps you were over-reacting? If not, without a police car number, how can they identify the officer, unless they utilize GPS.

I'm sorry if it ruined dinner! Scary drivers frighten me as well and makes me realize I have to be THAT MUCH MORE CAUTIOUS!

[Tracy]

I'll spare you my high speed accident story that was caused by a police officer because it's so traumatic that my DH has had nightmares about what he saw. Suffice it to say that I would absolutely write that letter. Police are human too. They can make a bad choice that can cause severe harm and what he did could have resulted in killing someone. {{{K}}}

[Kootiepoot]

first I would have to clean out my pants. I am sure that was scary.

I am going to say one thing however, due to the fact that most of my family are cops. Please do not take this as a judgement of you. One of the biggest complaints cops (and emergency vehicle drivers in general) have is that people do not follow the laws about yielding. You are to pull over and stop for an emergency vehicle in either lane. People usually slow down (although sometimes not) if there is a lights and sirens behind them in thier lane but many times they do not if it is in the oncoming lane. This creates a really difficult situation. One of the reasons for the lights and sirens both is because of visibility issues.

Both of my brothers have been hit while in lights and siren mode by drivers who pulled through intersections. Neither of them were in "high speed" situations. They also have countless stories of ambulances who are hit or slowed to a stop because drivers will not yield to the lights and sirens.

That little psa over, I do need to add that high speed pursuits are very dangerous and most jurisdictions have policies against them, or at the least very specific rules about them.

Again this wasn't about you. There are certainly really bad drivers even amongst the police and I wasn't there. I'm glad you were not struck and everyone is ok.

[karunamayi]

Thanks shannon and tracy. And Kris... I appreciate the difficulty that emergency response teams face. In my younger years, I was riding 3rds on an ambulance for training. I then went and got pregnant with Sterling, so that was canned.

Anyways... I could see with my eyes the frustration of driving and I could hear with my ears the frustration of the drivers. The mood of ambulance drivers and cops is different, tho.

I *always* pull over when I hear sirens. it's kind of a respectful *shout out* to my past, along with, you know..... the law. lol

because we were coming up the hill, we didn't hear or see his lights, siren or car for that matter. he just appeared right infront of us as we came up. That route is small, but a major artery so I guarantee that he knew it was blind for him.

The only way I can suspect that they can track the particular officer is that I can state the time, direction and place precisely and they have to indicate all these things on the way to a call to dispatch. Well, maybe not the place where *I* was freaked, but definately where he was coming from, at what time and which direction he was going in. There were no other police cars, either.

I seriously doubt, by looking at his face, that he realized what he did was wrong and potentially *very* dangerous. He was just focused right ahead, with no reaction on his face. This is why I'm tempted to write a letter bc I doubt he is going to self-correct.