Request By:
Mr. Robert Highhouse
Chief of Police, City of Ludlow
Ludlow, Kentucky 41016
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Thomas R. Emerson, Assistant Attorney General
This is in reply to your letter raising a question in regard to the operation of private automobiles by members of the volunteer fire department.
Fire protection for the fourth class City of Ludlow is provided by the Ludlow Volunteer Fire Department. When the fire department's personnel are needed a siren is sounded and they then proceed to the fire station where the department's vehicles are kept. Lately complaints have been received pertaining to the manner in which the fire department's personnel are driving their vehicles while responding to the siren's call. Fire department personnel in their private vehicles, operating without flashing red lights and sirens, have been observed speeding, violating traffic signals and signs and generally driving in a reckless manner.
Your letter concludes:
"My question is, are these volunteers when responding to the fire station to answer a call required to obey the prescribed traffic laws such as speed limits, traffic signals, stop signs, and reckless operation of a motor vehicle, or are they relieved of such responsibility due to the nature of their response to a suspected fire or squad emergency. "
KRS 189.910 to 189.950 deal with "Emergency Vehicles" and KRS 189.910(1) defines in part an "emergency vehicle" as any vehicle used for emergency purposes by a fire department or any motor vehicle used by a volunteer fireman while responding to an emergency. KRS 189.950(4) states in part that any person who is a regular or volunteer member of any fire department furnishing fire protection for a political subdivision of the state may equip his vehicle with red flashing, rotating or oscillating lights and a siren, bell or exhaust whistle if he has first been given permission, in writing, to do so by the chief of fire department. Furthermore, such lights and equipment may only be used while the person is proceeding to the scene of a fire or other emergency in the performance of his official duties as a member of the fire department.
KRS 189.940 sets forth the exemptions from traffic regulations. Paragraph (1) thereof states that the speed limitations set forth in the Kentucky Revised Statutes do not apply to emergency vehicles when responding to emergency calls and when the drivers thereof are operating the vehicle's warning lights and are giving audible signals by siren, bell, or exhaust whistle. Paragraph (2) of KRS 189.940 states that the driver of an emergency vehicle, when responding to an emergency call and giving the warning required by subsection (1), upon approaching any red light or stop signal or any stop sign shall slow down as necessary for safety to traffic, but may proceed past such red or stop light or stop sign with due regard for the safety of persons using the street or highway. Note also that paragraph (6) of KRS 189.940 states that the drivers of emergency vehicles are not relieved from the duty to drive with due regard for the safety of all persons and property upon the highway.
In OAG 76-165, copy enclosed, we said that a privately owned vehicle of a volunteer fireman, equipped with the proper lights and audible devices pursuant to KRS 189.950(4), is an "emergency vehicle" for purposes of being exempt from traffic regulations under KRS 189.940 when responding to emergency calls. Even the to emergency calls. Even the drivers of these vehicles, however, do not have absolute immunity as they are required to show due regard for the safety of all persons and property upon the highways.
In response to your question, it is, therefore, our opinion that a privately owned vehicle of a volunteer fireman, not equipped with and thus not using the proper lights and audible devices set forth in KRS 189.950(4), is not an "emergency vehicle" and is not exempt from traffic regulations under KRS 189.940. The driver of such a vehicle, proceeding to the fire station in response to an alarm, must observe all traffic laws in the same manner required of other drivers.