It is more than likely that when you got your license They won’t mention it, but get into a traffic jam It is easy to turn on the emergency lights while braking. It is something almost instinctive, a warning for the one that goes 120 km/h behind you realize that you don’t brake for no reason. And if you don’t, you’ve probably seen it. However, the curious thing is that the General Driving Regulations do not contemplate this action.
Because we do it to avoid accidents, but with the law in hand, the use of warnings It’s not what we have to do when we get into a traffic jam.. And yet, there are even new cars that activate them automatically if the system notices that we brake repeatedly. The most curious thing is that it is not bad nor is it a fault.
Simply put, the law was written for cars from another era.
Although current cars have been eliminating more and more buttons, relegating them to the screensthe emergency lights is one that has remained a physical and tactile piece. It is logical because it is a security element and it is one that we have well located in the control panel.
When braking in traffic jams, it is almost a reflex for many drivers to use the emergency light button to warn those behind them of the situation. In fact, some new cars activate them automatically if the sensors (the accelerometer or the brake pressure sensor) detect a sudden deceleration or if the ABS comes into play. If the braking is progressive, they are not activated automatically.
The use of emergency lights in a traffic jam: yes, but no (and vice versa)
But… what does the law say? As our colleagues remember Motorpassionhe section C of article 109 The General Traffic Regulations of 2003 establish that the correct way to notify those behind us about this situation is:
“The intention to immobilize the vehicle or to brake its progress considerably, even when such events are imposed by traffic circumstances, must be warned, whenever possible, by repeatedly using the brake lights or by moving the arm alternately up and down with short and quick movements.”
The problem is that theory is one thing, but in practice, if we are slamming on the brakes It is difficult to walk by lifting your foot off the brake.. Much less by lowering the window and warning with signs. It is much easier to turn on the emergency lights, and the person in the back will also see them better than if we put our arm out the window.
Why does the law say this? Because it is an article written in another era. It is an anachronism resulting from times in which the ABS It was not so present and in which, to avoid the wheels locking and the car skidding, we did have to lift our foot off the brake. In this way, we were automatically alerting the person behind us.
Therefore, the law does not say that we put on the emergency lights in a traffic jam, but they are not going to fine us for it because the DGT understands the good intention when it comes to notifying other drivers about an anomaly in traffic. In fact, the fact that the law does not establish it, but the cars do, speaks about the discrepancy between the “strict law” and reality.
The DGT itself advertises it:
In fact, here comes the technicality of “whenever possible”a legal hole that protects us when turning on the emergency lights. Now, where it is mandatory to give these lights is when we cannot travel at the minimum speed on the road. That is, if we are in a traffic jam on a highway and we do not reach half the speed of the road, we will have to turn on our lights.
Section 3 of article 49 says:
“When a vehicle cannot reach the minimum required speed and there is a danger of overtaking, direction indicator lights with an emergency signal must be used while driving.”
Will the regulations be modified at some point to reflect the current situation in which all cars launched these last 21 years Do they have ABS? It is not known, but since it is a universal code to alert of the situation, I imagine that it will not be one of the Administration’s priorities.
Of course, you have probably found someone who has used them excessively, giving you a scare for no reason when you turn them on in a non-critical situation. And that, precisely, is what happened with some models from the 2000s that turned on the emergency lights automatically, even when braking to exit the highway.
For example, early models of Citroen C4 either Peugeot 307 who were ahead of the rest with something that wasn’t going entirely well.
Images | Kathy, Prithivi Rajan
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