Watch This Ambulance Almost Flip After Getting T-Boned at an Intersection in Russia

The question is, who’s at fault here?

byKyle Cheromcha|
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When emergency services are responding to a call, their lights and sirens aren't quite a blanket of invincibility. We've pointed out before how speeding through a red light without stopping—flashing lights or no—can lead to a disastrous crash, as well as how dangerous it can really be to operate an ambulance even at normal speeds. Today's example via RoadCams is a great reminder for both drivers to pay attention and responders to slow down just a bit in these situations.

Filmed somewhere in Russia, the dash cam footage shows several cars waiting for the light at a large four-way intersection. The cars only move a few feet when the light changes, because you can already hear a siren blaring before the ambulance comes speeding in from the right.

Unfortunately, the driver of the second car in the line across the street opposite the camera car, a little Mazda 3, appears to not hear the approaching wail. He drives around the first car, which stopped in the process of making a left turn, so we guess that's why the Mazda driver doesn't think twice as he heads straight into the intersection.

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A few seconds later, the Mazda smacks square into the side of the ambulance, which flies up on two wheels for a disconcerting amount of time as it keeps going and nearly flattens a woman and her baby standing on the corner waiting to cross the street. Amazingly, the van falls back on four wheels and rolls to a stop just past the intersection. The driver of the camera car then pulls around to check on the paramedics.

So while the Mazda driver is definitely at fault here, it's also incumbent on first responders to drive a little more carefully through these situations than the ambulance crew did here. Even though the van driver likely saw the other stopped traffic and assumed he didn't need to slow down, speeding through a red light isn't the best idea. As The Drive's resident EMT Max Goldberg said, the whole point is to "arrive alive." 

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