is something i have no problem with as in the case i refer too it was an open road, good visibility, dry etc, perfect get a move on conditions.
In truck late last night around midnight, quiet dual carriageway only me and a car gaining on me from behind, with another a long way back but gaining.
When closest car was at a point he might have considered staring to pull out to overtake, the fast moving vehicle had covered that ground and swept past, it was in fact a police vehicle, i won't give any further details for any reason.
Now for all i know he could have been on a call, but keeping blue lights off for operational purposes.
If it wasn't operational i'm making it clear i have no objection to the old bill making proper fast use of the roads...keeping their hand in etc etc when relatively safe to do so makes a lot of sense, be damn stupid if the only time an officer gets to explore the vehicles capabilities was in the pouring rain in an emergency.
I did wonder at the time if the driver of the car closest to me hadn't been quite with it, or hadn't realised the closing speed, it was after midnight, it might have been seen another way.
Is there provision for the old bill to make use of their blue lights in such circumstances as a safety aid to making progress, or would such a thing be frowned on unless 'justifiable'?
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The responsibility for a safe overtake has to rest with the overtaker, so If someone pulls out to overtake in front of someone who is already overtaking them, then the mimser-would-be-overtaker has to take the blame.
Hopefully some points too, there's enough traffic, we could do with thinning out the ones who've been given a fair crack at the driving thing and failed.
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If the car behind you hadn't seen the fast approaching car I doubt if blue lights would make much difference. Mirrors are beyond some peoples understanding.
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Police drivers do practise driving quickly on public roads.
There was a Durham copper who was 'caught' doing 100mph+ in Scotland in the Durham force's shiny new BMW.
It was on a weekend, 150 miles outside his area, and near a town where his son attends university.
We evil press people made a few allegations about a jolly, and inappropriate use of force resources.
"Not so," we were told. "It was a training exercise, and there were no suitable roads nearer."
I was going to say you couldn't make it up, but I think they probably did.
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When I did my class 1 about 40yrs ago, we certainly had no suitable roads in the City Police area.
On the south side, there was about 50yds of de-restricted road until the Cheshire force took over. Nothing I can recall north of the city.
We used to do high speed, non-motorway work on the Northwich by-pass. I don't know if the Cheshire police were told in advance, as a courtesy. There was a convenient place near Sandiway where the carriageways were some distance apart and the access/crossover road made a convenient spot for a bit of tyre squealing using a couple og Jags to replicate a high speed bandit chase...all good fun.
Night driving took us as far as Conway where flasks and sarnies would be produced sat by the sea....to prying eyes, we were on a ' jolly '
Ted
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A while back I saw two unmarked BMW 5 series cars with discrete "Police driving school" plates on the back They were from Durham, so that must have been on the plates too.
They were parked under the Forth Rail Bridge in South Queensferry with the eight occupants having their lunch time sandwiches.
Long range training or jolly? I think training, you can cover a lot of ground with a skilled driver.
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...Long range training or jolly?...
It seemed odd to us there were no suitable training roads between Durham and Scotland - lots of wide open spaces and challenging roads in Northumberland to the north, Cumbria to the west, and to a lesser extent, North Yorkshire to the south, and Teesside/Cleveland to the east.
That's apart from County Durham itself, which is a large, sparsely populated county.
To our simple minds, it seemed to make more sense to train on roads and in an area where the officer would drive 'for real'.
Adding the weekend and son at university nearby made our conclusion inevitable.
The force's explanation was reported, so it was left up to the reader to decide.
Doing the right thing and being seen to do the right thing are not always the same.
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"To our simple minds, it seemed to make more sense to train on roads and in an area where the officer would drive 'for real'."
Fair point but its easy to drive on roads you know. If you spend 3 weeks on a driving course you soon run out of local roads. The true test of skills where you can be seen applying the techniques is on unknown roads. However the Instructor does know the roads just incase there is a particular feature that need particular care.
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The fuzz are welcome to hammer about wherever they like as far as I'm concerned. Provided they do it properly and with due care and competence of course.
I am always greatly heartened by the spectacle of proper drivers seriously getting on with it, whoever they are. It's becoming a rare sight these days what with all the cameras, mimser processions and social pressure to behave like a terrified incompetent rabbit. The fuzz are the least of our problems, especially when they are showing us how it ought to be done.
Of course an unholy clamour tends to be made when one of them screws up badly under those circumstances. It goes with the territory. With certain privileges come certain responsibilities.
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...Fair point but its easy to drive on roads you know. If you spend 3 weeks on a driving course you soon run out of local roads...
FC - and Ted earlier - thanks for that.
You've both done/doing the job, so know more about it than us outsiders.
I can see the point about running out of local roads, but it's always going to be hard to justify to the public that police drivers need to travel 150 miles for training.
Speaking of police training, what happened to the Centrex centres?
There used to be one at Durham, but I think it was shut.
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>> but it's always going to be hard to justify to the public that police drivers need to travel 150 miles for training.
150 training miles is only a 2 hour session. That'd only give each candidate an hour at the wheel.
I'd be expecting ~3 times that per day on some courses. A run from Durham to Perth and back might do the job.
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Police driving schools have 'approved routes', they are risk assessed. Driving schools have written approval from the Secretary of State to utilise police exemptions on training runs.
There are more low key 'driving assessments' which would not involve driving schools, but would use local drivng assessors (not trainers) but neither would they be 150 mile journeys.
I am aware that sometimes police officers will use police exemptions to familiarise themselves with a new car or a car they are unfamiliar with, so that when they use it 'in anger' they know what they are doing with it. It's a grey area and not condoned. If done sensibly and sparingly, i'd say it's possibly a good idea...however there's always one clown that takes the urine.
As AC has said above..if it all goes horribly wrong they're on their own...probably as it should be.
I do think though that there should be regular sessions on motor racing circuits, so that emergency service drivers are used to driving at speed and keep their skills up...wouldn't cost that much would it, during the week...cost says 'no'. Can't see it ever happening.
Last edited by: VxFan on Thu 28 Jul 11 at 21:19
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Police cars getting a move on - Skoda
