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news
Near Miss of the Day 550: Unmarked police car driver weaves through cyclists
Here’s an interesting entry in our Near Miss of the Day series – the driver of what we presume is an unmarked police car starting to overtake a cyclist and thinking better of it due to a couple of other riders; as well as another motor vehicle, coming in the other direction then after weaving through them, flashing their blue lights.
The footage was filmed in northwest Kent by road.cc reader Philip, who said there was no apparent reason for the driver to have flashed the lights other than because “that for some reason excused and justified their bad driving.”
He told us: “Having just cycled up Hogtrough Hill (just next to the better known Brasted Hill in Kent) I was heading down a quiet country lane. I started taking a left turn, arm out in a clear signal with a car still approaching on the opposite side of the road. The car then continued to turn as I turned but onto the wrong side of the road, towards an oncoming car and two other bicycles.
“The car then had to stop sharply but couldn’t pull over because by this point it was parallel to me and had nowhere to go. It pulled in behind me, allowed the oncoming car and bikes to pass and then continued to pass me. While I was fine and nobody came close to me, had the oncoming traffic been faster or closer we could all have been seriously hurt.
“As I gave my usual disappointed shake of my head that I reserve for this sort of thoughtless driving the car lit up its blue lights. I can only assume that this was to show me that it was an unmarked Police car and that for some reason excused and justified their bad driving. There was no reason to light up its lights after passing the other vehicles and while passing me and at no other point were their blue lights on and almost as quickly as they passed, they turned off their lights again. (Note, in the video their side lights appear to flicker but this is just a side effect of the camera’s frame-rate).”
He added: “I find in general road users’ lack of consideration for cyclists disappointing but it is really sad that I often find that the Police are just as bad as any other ‘regular’ driver.”
> Near Miss of the Day turns 100 - Why do we do the feature and what have we learnt from it?
Over the years road.cc has reported on literally hundreds of close passes and near misses involving badly driven vehicles from every corner of the country – so many, in fact, that we’ve decided to turn the phenomenon into a regular feature on the site. One day hopefully we will run out of close passes and near misses to report on, but until that happy day arrives, Near Miss of the Day will keep rolling on.
If you’ve caught on camera a close encounter of the uncomfortable kind with another road user that you’d like to share with the wider cycling community please send it to us at info [at] road.cc or send us a message via the road.cc Facebook page.
If the video is on YouTube, please send us a link, if not we can add any footage you supply to our YouTube channel as an unlisted video (so it won't show up on searches).
Please also let us know whether you contacted the police and if so what their reaction was, as well as the reaction of the vehicle operator if it was a bus, lorry or van with company markings etc.
> What to do if you capture a near miss or close pass (or worse) on camera while cycling
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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104 comments
By luck only, not management. That's the thing about risk.
Safe driving is all about reducing risk. This twonk did quite the opposite. Then flashed his lights as if t say "it's okay, I'm a highly trained driver"
Incorrect. That's what you want to see.
There are a range of views presented in the comments. Most commenters are experienced road users and can recognise shit driving when we see it.
The red car driver's PoV - and their pathetic excuses - is not (and should not be) the only way to analyse their behaviour.
obvs I disagree . Note the italics there. is that like an enraged hiss.
The red car driver is rather anonymous in this though. they have made no excuses.
Perhaps they should have used blue lights and sirens to begin with, no sign of blue lights unti after the junction, taken dangerously.
Blue lights on from the begining should mean that cyclist pulls over and unmarked car can take junction on correct side of the ride. Landrover can't see the police car until they are face to face, has no reason to expect it will come round the corner on the wrong side. And no sires or blue lights either.
The Highway Code disagrees with you
No, their emergency is not our problem. Blue lights should not be seen as a sign off to endanger lives that are nothing to do with your current job.
Driving safely around the vulnerable is not a courtesy, it is a bare minimum.
If you read the accompanying text, it is indicated that the police weren't attending an emergency; they just flashed their blue lights to indicate they are police and therefore above the law (at least it's presumed that must have been what they intended to signal). They did not have their blue lights flashing as the approached the junction. After passing the cyclist and flashing the lights, they then turned off the blue lights again and carried on their merry way.
Even if the police were attending an emergency, they are not above the law and the RTA still applies, with specific limited exceptions for emergency services. It's a long read, but there's some detailed discussion in the Guardian article from a while back: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/jul/02/deaths-uk-police-pursuits-c...
Ho do you know its the police ?
It could be a fire officer on his way to an incident.
Also how do you know if it is the police if they where attending a incident or not . Have you got a secret connection to emergency services despatch you havent tod anyone about.
Do fire officers generally drive unmarked cars with concealed blue lights?
Yes they do.
https://www.fireservice.co.uk/information/blue-lights/
Interesting, thanks for the data
[/quote]
Do fire officers generally drive unmarked cars with concealed blue lights?
[/quote]
They do in many cases yes. But if ot was a fire officer on an emergency call their blue lights would be on for the duration of the journey, and two tone horns would be used where appropriate.
Regardless of whether it's the police, ambulance, or fire service on an emergency call they would have blue lights on for the whole time.
Sure, just as soon as the call comes in.
'So what' about all of this? No emergency response driver is taught to put other lives at risk in order to save time. Whoever this was wasn't 'responding', they were just driving like a twat, and trying to defend it makes you just as bad as them.
Thanks for that.
I didnt see anyones lives put at risk. In fact they drove into the turning very slowly.
So what purpose did cutting the corner actually serve?
[/quote]
So what purpose did cutting the corner actually serve?
[/quote]
avoiding the cyclist obvs
Avoiding the cyclist by overtaking on a corner that you can't see what's coming. Had the 4x4 been faster or sooner, our fireman friend would have responded by either taking the hit or swerving into the rider - I wonder which option they would have selected.....
Or, and this is a real stretch but bear with me, take the corner as you are supposed to (eg on the correct side of the road) , remain behind the rider until it is safe to pass, and do so in a competent and safe manner.
Obvs
its not really like that in the video though is it but I understand your need to take a worse case scenario about all these clickbait roadcc videos.
O'taking on a junction - tick
Turning into an essentially blind corner on the incorrect side of the road- tick
approaching 4x4 only seen at last second - tick
Shit driving with no regard for other road users -tick
My description seems to be at least reasonable and defensible
However your "it was safe cos they were going slowly, and overtaking on a junction is fine cos it's a good place to do it" seems to be inconsistent with the HWC, safe driving theory, or indeed reality.
Dude, you are feeling sore cos a number of people have reasonably challenged your view that the driver behaved safely. As more than one has pointed out, the HWC also disagrees, as do a couple of past and present coppers in the comments.
S'fine, but be a bigger person and retire gracefully rather than digging in.
I'm not the one getting hot under the collar on here.
Its the usual list of angry people as far as I can see..
Lol course you aren't. Have a great weekend dude
and you !
I don't know it was police; I assumed based on the article title. It does seem most likely to have been police given the unmarked car, but the rest of what I said applies to any emergency service.
Again, I can't prove they weren't attending an emergency, I can only point out that their behaviour did not seem typical of emergency services if they were in fact attending an emergency.
Finally, my point was that even if they were attending an emergency, that does not absolve them of a duty of care to other road users.
If they were on a blue light emergency call then their lights should be on the whole time, and they would also use two tones where appropriate
Thatll be generally true but an incident may be called off while someone is on their way and then they'll turn them off.
So which is it?
Was this driver responding to an emergency call and should have had blue loghts on the while time.
or had the call been cancelled, in which case no justification for taking the junction on the wrong side.
Wow
So the lights went on after the incompetent and dangerous turn into the junction, stayed on for 5s (check the vid) and then went off.
So that "emergency" was called and revoked in the space of 10 seconds if accounting for having to receive the call, negotiate the turn, operate the lights, receive the second call and deactivate the lights, all whilst overtaking one cyclist in the face of others.
Even if there was a call (and when considering the above, the balance of probability is that the driver was actually just being a twonk, and using the blues to either say sorry, or wave their willy) the actions of the driver would not have borne the risk-benefit analysis for that behaviour ;
And approaching that 'I can't see into this junction, anything could be around the corner' junction, sirens were definitely appropriate.
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