We do everything we can to keep our tow truck operators safe on a daily basis — Rigorous safety training, high vis vests, bright flashing lights and safety markers at a minimum for each job. See, we love our team and want to see them go home to their families every night.
Unfortunately, their lives are put at risk on a regular basis through inattention, lack of education and poor decision making from motorists. Want to help us get them home safely each day too? Here are a few simple things you can do to contribute and improve overall road safety.
Pay attention to the road — that text is not more important than someone’s life
Texting and driving is something we see every single day on the roads. Literally every day. Drivers cruising down the highway at 100km/h+, engrossed in their phone, occasionally glancing out the windscreen.
The thing is, if something truly important is happening, you won’t receive a text message or Instagram notification for it, right? So that text can wait. There’s just no excuse to put the lives of everyone around you at risk because you want to reply to a message right this second.
The gravity of this just doesn’t seem to sink in for so many drivers. Their needless obsession with their phone can easily end someone’s life and that’s a risk they deem to be perfectly okay. Ludicrous.
When you see flashing lights, pay close attention to the situation
All first responder vehicles are decked out with bright flashing lights for a reason. It’s to make sure you’re paying attention to what’s going on, hopefully improving their safety and yours.
Look ahead, see what’s happening and do what you can to help everyone involved get home safely. Blasting past the scene at full speed, potentially centimeters away is far more risky than you think, which leads us to the next point.
Slow down and move over
Sadly, Queensland is yet to follow New South Wales and Western Australia in implementing “slow down and move over laws”. Still, that doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea!
When you see a tow truck or any kind of situation happening on the road, safely reduce your speed. If it’s safe to do so, move over to give them more space as well.
By doing this, you’re improving the safety of the tow truck operator and anyone else at the scene in a few ways:
- Giving them a bigger margin for error by leaving them more room to move
- Allowing you a greater reaction time if needed
- Reducing the amount of energy in a collision if something were to go drastically wrong
- Generally making everyone feel safer and more respected
Each of our tow truck drivers will tell you how frustrating and scary it can be to have yet another near miss. Vehicles regularly pass by at full speed, so close that if they were to just lean the wrong way, their life would be over.
Please, just slow down and move over. It’s for everyone’s safety, including yours!
No more rubbernecking
There’s a big difference between paying attention to what’s happening and rubbernecking. If you’ve slowed down, moved over to give them more space and can see that you can pass safely, keep your eyes on the road.
By slowing down even more to gawk at the roadside scene, you’re introducing a host of new dangers — you might even end up causing a new accident. If nothing else, it’ll cause traffic and frustration from other drivers.
How many times have you been stuck in stop-start traffic on the highway, only to find out the accident was on the other side? That gridlock was caused entirely by people wanting to slow down and look at the incident!
We can assure you if it’s a broken down car, it’s not interesting. If it’s a traumatic accident, you don’t want to see.
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So, the next time you see a tow truck or any other flashing lights on the side of the road, remember these basic tips. Tow truck services, our drivers and their families thank you for helping them make it home safely.