Move out of the way of UHP troopers on the road

A rash of Utah Highway Patrol troopers narrowly escaping serious injury after their vehicles were hit on the road has prompted a warning:

Unless motorists use more caution driving near UHP vehicles, troopers will start enforcing a law that requires drivers to move over a lane when passing a UHP car that has its overhead lights flashing.

"We're getting to that point," said UHP Col. Scott Duncan.

Between Oct. 30 and Nov. 30, eight UHP vehicles were hit around the state. None of those incidents resulted in serious injuries. Now, troopers want to remind residents to give them some room.

"From our perspective, that's eight (accidents) too many," Duncan said.

The accidents have run the gamut: vehicles being sideswiped, rear-ended, hit while the trooper was in the car and while he was standing outside the car.

Trooper Larry Orton had just pulled over a vehicle on I-15 near Cedar City on Nov. 4 when a semitrailer truck driver, who may have been reaching for a drink, sideswiped the car on the driver's side door. Orton had approached the car from the passenger's side.

"If I had not done that I'd been killed," he said, adding that the female driver in the car "was within a fraction of an inch of dying."

Trooper Chip Blair, who is based in Park City, was at an incident in a rural area of Summit County on Oct. 30 when he was rear-ended by another vehicle and pushed into the vehicle pulled over in front of him. There were no serious injuries.

Between July 1 and Oct. 30, seven UHP vehicles were hit. But the winter weather seems to have brought out the worst in drivers, Duncan said.

"The problem is people are not paying attention to what's on the road," he said.

The Highway Patrol wants the court system to increase the fines for drivers who fail to yield to a UHP vehicle, Duncan said.

In his 27-year career, Orton said his patrol car has been hit eight times.

"I've been really lucky," he said. "But that may not be the case next time."

His last incident, he said, initially affected the way he did his job after he went back to work.

"I was really looking behind me," he said. " You never know when you're going to run across a real bad dude."

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