TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WTXL) - The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles is releasing data that shows more than 200 crashes, 70 injuries, and over 500-traffic tickets are due to motorists failing to move over for emergency vehicles.
That's a 36 percent spike since 2015.
Under state law, drivers are required to move over one lane when police, emergency vehicles, tow trucks, utility vehicles or garbage trucks are present on the shoulder of a road.
If traffic is too heavy for a car to move over, the vehicle must slow down to 20 miles per hour below the posted speed limit as it passes by.
Many drivers fail to follow the law.
"It is very scary to be on the side of the road, and to have a car pass you by at full speed without slowing down or taking the initiative to move over," said FHP Captain Jeffrey Bissainthe. "It's our safety out there, and we all want to make it back home to our families."
Drivers can be pulled over and ticketed for failing to move over.
The law was first passed in 2002 for emergency vehicles.
Utility and garbage trucks were added to the statute in 2014.
