An impatient driver who put firefighters' lives at risk by speeding through an accident scene near Clyde was part of a worrying trend in the South, a Fenz manager says.
Fire and Emergency New Zealand Otago group manager Bobby Lamont said the car sped through "showing no regard for the safety of emergency service personnel at the scene".
The "frustrated and impatient driver" ignored road accident signs and firefighters asking them to slow down, he said.
"It turned into a very dangerous situation for our people."
The April incident in Clyde was not an isolated case, he said.
Near misses were increasing across the country but particularly in Otago and Southland.
In February, a firefighter at a car crash was verbally abused and almost dragged out of a fire truck by a man apparently angry the road was blocked at a two-car crash in Playfair St, Caversham.
The man also drove on the wrong side of the road past firefighters managing traffic.
In 2023, on State Highway 6 near the intersection of Lake Hayes-Arrowtown Rd, a person drove through a crash scene at speed, hitting an accident sign.
"The sign was flung about 10m at force and only narrowly avoided hitting a firefighter."
Mr Lamont was worried that it was only a matter of time before one of his firefighters was injured.
"People must be patient when the road is blocked by a crash.
"We put traffic management in place for the safety of everyone involved, including motorists."
He said drivers were endangering themselves, other motorists, emergency services, and the people involved in the crash.
Statistics showed that nationally there were 55 health and safety events in the past two years under the category of "motorist behaviours at incident ground".
However, most cases went unreported, Mr Lamont said.
Unsafe driver behaviour was "so commonplace now that often our people won’t report the ‘minor’ incidents".
"We really just want everyone to be safe and need drivers to get on board to help us with that." — APL
