On Thursday, April 7, 2022, I was driving a friend and her three-year-old granddaughter back from Peoria.
We were on the interstate. The rain was coming down lightly at the time, but the road was quite wet from the earlier downpours. Traffic was moving along smoothly. I was in the left lane passing another car when the pickup truck in front of me swerved suddenly into the right lane. I was shocked and slowed down just in time to see the obstacle that he had managed to avoid – what appeared to be a hunk of black metal sitting directly in front of me in the left lane. I swerved into the right lane, praying no one was close enough to hit us or be hit by my car. Unfortunately, I couldn’t swerve fast enough to avoid hitting what I now saw was a dark-colored car with no lights or flashers on. I clipped the right back corner of his car, slid across the right lane, and traveled several yards through the ditch before the car finally came to a rest.
Luckily, no one in my car was injured, although our little three-year-old in the back seat, try as she might to hold back her tears, finally lost her composure and began to cry. Physically she was all right; emotionally she was a frightened and sobbing mess.
A few people stopped to check on us and called for the police to come. I told them we were okay, but I wanted to know about the person in the other car. No one knew. No one had seen him. One or two even questioned whether or not there was another car. I kept pointing back to the object still sitting in the road, but it took them a while to recognize that he was there. Eventually, he turned on his flashers and moved his car to the right side of the road.
Before the adventure was over, we were surrounded by police cars, two ambulances, two tow trucks, and a fire engine with lights flashing brightly. And this is the “what’s up with that” part. While the tow truck was trying to pull my car from the ditch and the police were taking statements from everyone, the traffic in the left lane NEVER SLOWED DOWN. With the right lane closed to traffic, these cars, trucks, and other vehicles flew past us as if nothing were going on. Seventy, eighty miles an hour or more, semis, pickups, SUVs, and minivans drove past us at breakneck speeds as if we were not there.
There is a law in this state – in every state - that requires traffic to slow down when passing emergency vehicles at accident scenes or when an officer has someone stopped at the side of the road. In case people have forgotten it, let me remind you.
(625
ILCS 5/11-601) (from Ch. 95 1/2, par. 11-601)
Sec. 11-601. General speed
restrictions.
(a) No vehicle may be driven upon
any highway of this State at a speed which is greater than is reasonable and
proper with regard to traffic conditions and the use of the highway, or
endangers the safety of any person or property. The fact that the speed of a
vehicle does not exceed the applicable maximum speed limit does not relieve
the driver from the duty to decrease speed when approaching and crossing an
intersection, approaching and going around a curve, when approaching a
hillcrest, when traveling upon any narrow or winding roadway, or when special
hazard exists with respect to pedestrians or other traffic or by reason of
weather or highway conditions. Speed must be decreased as may be necessary to
avoid colliding with any person or vehicle on or entering the highway in compliance
with legal requirements and the duty of all persons to use due care. (https://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/fulltext.asp?DocName=062500050K11-601: highlights, underlining, and italics added
)
In other words, just because you are in the
left lane when the accident is on the right does not give you the right
to endanger the rescue workers and the accident victims by speeding through the
scene. This law clearly says that vehicles MUST SLOW DOWN when there is
an accident on the roadway.
So many times, I have watched cars come
through an accident scene or a construction zone, usually forced to slow down by
respectable drivers who follow the law, that fly around those other vehicles the
first chance they get and speed off as if their life depended on it or their
seat was on fire. Their total disregard for the lives and safety of others is reprehensible
and unforgivable. How many lives must be sacrificed before these people learn
to follow the law?
We had a three-year-old child who had to
stand on the road with us while they pulled my car out of the ditch. Her life
was in danger as were the lives of every officer, rescue worker, tow truck driver,
my friend, and myself because of the recklessness of those drivers who were
unwilling to slow down for a matter of thirty seconds to pass us by.
What’s up with that?!
