PHOENIX — Crispin Chavira is the engineer of Phoenix Fire Engine 960.
“Being an engineer means I get to drive the big red truck,” Chavira said.
Driving the big red truck is a huge responsibility.
“It can be very stressful getting to a call,” Chavira said. “A lot of times, getting to the call can be a lot more stressful than the call itself.”
Part of the reason it’s stressful is because of other drivers.
Chavira says, on a daily basis, the majority of drivers follow the rules and move over, but a select few make it difficult.
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“A lot of times we see people panic, they stay still, move to the left, or try and outrun the fire truck, and all of that is very dangerous,” Chavira said.
According to Arizona law, when an emergency vehicle has lights and sirens on, drivers must yield, drive to the right-hand edge or curb of the roadway, and stop until the emergency vehicle has passed.
“A temporary delay for you may be a second chance for someone else’s life, so if people could pull over to the right and stop for us, that would be greatly appreciated,” Fire Captain D.J. Lee said.
Lee adds that if you are in an intersection, then drivers should continue through the intersection and then pull over to the right.
ABC15 rode along with Chavira as he headed to multiple emergency calls with Engine 960 on Wednesday.
Chavira frequently had to avoid or go around drivers not following the law.
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On one street, a driver in a red car stopped, but did so in the middle of the road. Chavira had to pull around the driver into an oncoming traffic lane to continue heading to the call.
“Having to stop like that added maybe 30 seconds to our call response,” Chavira said.
Driving to another call, many drivers at intersections were not paying attention to the fire truck coming in the other direction. Twice, drivers continued through and turned left in front of Chavira as he was attempting to get through the intersections with lights and sirens on.
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“That’s why we operate really safely and stop at every intersection that’s a red light,” Chavira said. “Cars cut us off — it happens a lot.”
Captain Lee and Chavira say drivers aren’t trying to intentionally slow down emergency response times. Unfortunately, they say they are often distracted either by their phones or loud music and simply don’t hear or see the emergency vehicles coming.
“We can’t force people over, we can’t force people to stop,” Lee said. “Just keep that awareness.”
“It could be a neighbor, a family member, one day it could be you,” Chavira said. “When people do their part and move to the right, it gives us those extra seconds to get safely to the scene. That can be the difference between someone being alive or dead.”
