103 people fined for slowing down to film burning truck on motorway
More than 100 motorists were fined for slowing down to film an HGV that had caught fire after colliding with another truck on 13 July.
More than 100 people were fined in France for slowing down to film a burning heavy goods vehicle on the motorway.
Of course, everyone slows down when passing an incident on the road. This is for the safety of everyone in the area. Getting past a wreckage as fast as possible is of no benefit to anyone.
However, there is a difference between slowing down to maintain a safe speed and so as to not put anyone in any additional danger when passing an accident, and slowing down so you can savour the event. That was the sin of 103 French motorists on 13 July 2022, France Bleu reports.
They had slowed down to film a burning heavy goods vehicle (HGV) that had stopped at the side of the French motorway, A7.
The fire was started when two northbound trucks collided at around 15:30 on the afternoon of 13 July. On the northbound side of the motorway, the lanes were closed so emergency workers could deal with the incident. On the southbound side, though- that is where people slowed down to film what was going on.
The result was a 30km traffic jam on the A7 that was, ultimately, entirely avoidable.
France Bleu reports the perplexity of the French police officers who were there to deal with the accident, but who had not seen such an amount of mobile phone use on the roads.
They are used to a certain amount, of course, but the 103 people who were fined were all caught within six hours of each other.
Second in-text image courtesy of France Bleu.
