Joe,
Yesterday afternoon on my way home from work, I received a call that my uncle, who works with me, had overturned his vehicle on Route 54 in Delaware. Thankfully my uncle was unhurt in the wreck. As soon as I got the call I headed towards where the accident was. Upon arrival I expected to see the police and fire company to be there. But to my amazement they were not. Fortunately a few other drivers had stopped to check on my uncle and were also directing traffic. I do not know these peoples names but I would like to thank those people for their help. So after I checked on my uncle and made sure he was ok, I also helped direct traffic while waiting for emergency personnel to show up. Amazingly we had to call 911 back to see if they were on their way. the response we got was that the police were very busy, nothing about the fire department was mentioned. Finally, about an hour after the accident, DELDOT showed up to help direct traffic. However it was about 80-90 minutes after the accident that a Delaware State trooper showed up. The fire department never showed. When the officer came over to ask my uncle questions, instead of asking how he was, the officer demanded to know who me, my father, and another coworker were and why we were still at the scene. This seemed like an absurd question because we were directing traffic until someone showed up. The officer then began talking to my uncle about the accident. Understandably, my uncle questioned the officer as to why it took an hour and a half for someone to show up and why the fire department wasn't there. My uncle also mentioned that he was lucky he wasn't seriously hurt because he would have bled out by the time someone got there. After my uncle said this, the officer became somewhat irate and told him that if he had a problem with how long it took, my uncle could contact command and complain. He then very arrogantly said he didn't appreciate the questions that were being asked of him and didn't like my uncle's tone. Correct me if I am wrong, but wouldn't anyone be irate after they had just flipped their vehicle and it took emergency responders that long to respond?????? Anyways the accident scene was cleared and we were waiting on the officer to hand back the insurance information when he decided to write my uncle a ticket for driving unsafely. The crazy thing is that he was driving the speed limit....Well my uncle then asked the officer even if he was half dead in the hospital would he write him a ticket to which the officer responded yes....This blows me away considering some officers let politicians and their friends drive off without a DUI. So needless to say I am very disappointed and angry at the Delaware State Police.
On another note, some completely arrogant jerk decided that when we had traffic stopped that he was better than everyone else and he deserved to pass everyone in line and try to go by the accident. As soon as I saw him I told him to stop and wait a minute. This is what the DELDOT employee told us to do while he was moving his truck. When I waved this guy on after a couple minutes he threw his hands up in disgust. He then stopped next to me and tell me that we were causing a bottleneck and he also began yelling profanities at me and my father and also insults about my weight. So after just seeing how close my uncle had came to dying I lost my temper and responded to him to step out of his truck if he had a problem. The spineless coward then drove off with nothing to say. I hope he reads this and realizes what a non-caring pompous jerk he was. Thanks for letting me rant.
-An astonished family member
20 comments:
There is no valid reason for the way this accident was handled. I hope you get a response from the Dela Commander. Very glad your family is ok.
I guess the "protect and serve" part of being an officer is no longer a motto for some (and I stress some because there are great police and fireman out there) that have a badge. So sorry you went through that and glad your uncle is OK.
Appalling behavior for the state trooper.
Look at it this way - God knew that EMS couldn't respond quickly, so he made sure that your uncle wasn't overly hurt. Be thankful instead of being pissed off.
Non injury accident = very low priority. That is why it took so long. Delaware Troopers, along with many other police agencies, are stretched way too thin. It is far from the responding Trooper's fault. There were probably many more people still waiting after you. This is what you get when everyone wants to cut services. It will not get any better, it will only get worse.
Hey one more thing--How's that "change" working out for ya now??
As per protocol in Wicomico , if you call an accident in and say there are no injuries , only property damage you will only get the police. Unless there is a fire or hazmat spill , the fire dept is not needed. Maybe the reporting party didn't relay enough information to all the needed equipment.
I'm not sure about Delaware police but a few years ago when I was broadsided by someone on route 13, a state trooper told me that if a verhicle has to be towed away from the scene, it is the law that some sort of violation must be given. Its the officer's discretion, he can write a simple improper lane change or wreckless driving or anywhere inbetween. Not to be devil's advocate, but its pretty hard to flip a car driving the speed limit.
#1: I understand about a non-injury accident being low priority, but an overturned vehicle IS a hazmat situation because the fluids inside a vehicle are not made to stay in upside down.
#2: Officers are trained to have more patience than this officer is accused of. He acted in an unprofessional obviously not realizing that we citizens pay his paycheck. His writing of the ticket was just proof that there are infact officers who act as "rulers" not "officers."
And to think, I fought in a war to protect THEIR freedom!
for the accident being a non injury and that is why they didn't respond is absurd...do accident victims have a Phd now and are able to diagnose themselves...and what if a spark set the gas tank on fire...
Vehicles don't normally flip on their own without some human error involved. Appropriately, a citation was issued in this case. If the police respond to an accident scene, whoever is at fault deserves a ticket. Maybe people will learn to slow down and drive a little more cautiously...
5:12-
Not sure if I mentioned it in the letter but it is an suv which tend to roll over easier...plus the roads were wet so it is possible to overturn a vehicle driving the speed limit when it is 50 mph on a curvy road such as 54
Welcome to Sussex County.
Blame the long wait times on, low manpower, furlough days and having only two or three Troopers to cover the entire county. People continue to suffer and complain at the scene to the Trooper, but they need to take it to the elected officials and make a change. Non-injury collisions are put behind other incidents, again call priority is assigned by a duty officer and he has to make appropriate assignments based on call priority. I have nothing to say about the Troopers attitude except it should not have happened. By the way we Troopers are ordered not to tell citizens that we were busy, on another call or have no manpower for proper handling of calls. Were supposed to say we got here as fast as we could. The govenor and the command like to keep the public in the dark about lack of manpower.
No excuse for the fire service not responding. As to the police responding, if as in MD there are only 2 troopers on the the road at any given time in a county or patrol area, it may take some time for them to respond. If you said no one was hurt and the vehicle was off the road or that traffic direction was taken care of then the response wasn't priority. Let's go back to all those blogs complaining about how fast the police drive to destinations that aren't emergencies. No excuse for the officer being rude so long as your side of the coversation was nothing more than what you say.
I was always told there are no accidents, there is always a cause. If a driver is at fault, it is the officers duty to cite. There is discretion, but as a post here stated, if a report has to be written then a ticket probably should be too. Deer accidents and mechanical failures not due to neglect don't count.
It should really be no surprise it took so long for DSP to respond. It's pretty routine for them to take that long to respond to just a PD accident. If it was a reported as a PI then someone would have been there pretty quickly. PD accidents are not considered a priority. I'm retired from a local PD and have seen this a dozen times.
5:41 do you have any idea how many property damage only crashes occur daily? If the fire dept and ems was to respond to EVERY crash, they would nearly never stop responding.
That being said: I agree...someone told 911 there was no injuries. As for the Troopers actions, I won't speak to them cause I wasn't there.
Not to be insensitive but, how did the driver turn his vehicle over? RT54 has a max speed limit of 50 and 40 once you leave Selbyville except for one place that has 25. I drive this road every day and I am not aware of any part that is hazardous if you follow the posted limit.
"Thankfully my uncle was unhurt in the wreck."
"So after just seeing how close my uncle had came to dying I lost my temper and responded to him to step out of his truck if he had a problem."
Soo.... After your uncle was decapitated in this horrible wreck, did he stop at the Fenwick Car Wash to clean up his muddy car?
whom ever dialed 911 to report the accident may have stated that it didnt look like anyone was injured. In that case, the fire department would not have been dispatched. If the caller could not see any fluids leaking from the overturned vehicle then the fire department would still not be dispatched.
"There were probably many more people still waiting after you. This is what you get when everyone wants to cut services. It will not get any better, it will only get worse. "
So, in the process of cutting services, has there been any mention of tightening up the welfare roles? Spineless politicians protecting their "bought" votes.
Very low taxes in DE. You get what you pay for. The same reason why the roads in DE are bad, and they never get plowed in the winter. They don't hire many troopers up there, and there is no county police or Sheriff (with powers).
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