It is annoying.  People are sometimes shocked when you [i]do[/i] help them nowadays.  I don't know if people are afraid of lawsuits, or what.  I guess maybe they think someone else will call.  It's sad.

I get annoyed when people say "Oh, that was really nice of you to stop and help."

No it wasn't!!  You're [i]supposed[/i] to do that!!  I don't deserve a cookie for doing something I feel like I'm supposed to do.

[b]Are people so selfish that they won’t even pause their lives for a half an hour to help out some poor kid?[/b]

shit! you got to be kidding me, paul. hell, folks in the "mountain biker" thread openly threatened to hit cyclists!

actually help help out a fella? crap! half the folks on this board would rather put anther guys life in danger rather than slow down for 30 seconds to pass safely.

i applaud your ethic, paul. you are a part of a dying breed of our species.

[b]What has happened to our society that someone won’t render a bit of kindness to a fellow motorist?[/b]

well, most folks think themselves oh-so-important and live their oh-so-significant lives in such a oh-so-big-hurry than respect, common sense, courtesy and simple human dignity have long since been tossed in the trash can.

again, i salute your efforts. i'm certain that kid appreciated your concern, also.

Yep. Sad, but it's true. If there's nothing to be gained monetarily, most people simply think it isn't worth the effort.

Sad.

The thing that makes me mad is when someone is having car problems and is blocking a lane and holding up traffic.

Everyone just drives by, mad at them for holding up traffic. When all they would have to do is jump out and help get them off the road.

I whole-heartedly agree with you.

I used to have a 80 mile round trip to work, and back everyday. On I-95.

I always stop.

Even if no one is hurt, or you cant do anything else, STOP.  Offer some comfort.

You are a good man.

I had a similar experience.  I got knocked off the road by a young gal who did the police maneuver from the rear and sent me spinning into the median.  I was OK, but nobody even rolled down their window to ask.  Many cars just looked and drove on.

OTOH I have stopped several times to offer assistance and a few times have been overrun by people trying to assist.  

The bad experience happened in the Metro Atlanta area and the good experiences happened in the country.

Last time I had a car accident, everybody within sight stopped, some came back down the highway to see if I needed help, must have just been an Iowa thing

been a while since I witnessed anything, but I will and have stopped.

Last time I did so was in PRK, altamont (?) pass outside livermore. Made us late for work, but the people in the car and the chips were thankful.  we were asked what we saw happen and told 'em.  no biggie.


not knowing how to come across, but I think it would be a great idea if everyone knew CPR and basic first aid.

I always stop to see at the very least if they are okay. I have rendered first aid on several occasions, always call if needed, and have helped out more people than I can remember.
I am first aid/ cpr/ AED trained. I always have a substantial first aid kit in my truck and car.
Plus, Wisconsin has a "Good Samaritan" law that protects me from lawsuits (provided I don't exceed my training...I can't do an emergency tracheotomy....but standard first aid, cpr and stuff I can).

It is indeed sad when people don't help...and worse yet when they don't know what to do to help. No training in basics, no f/a kits, nothing to be prepared for an accident or emergency.

Thing is, its against the law if you don't try to render aid, yet if you unintentionally cause the person harm (i.e. had no medical training, or even if they did...), they could easily win a lawsuit or you could face criminal charges if something serious were to happen...

[antagonist]
Being that this is illegal, I hope the thread got locked...
[/antagonist]

The big excuse is "You never know what might happen to you!"

I stop and help cuz if it was me, I sure hope someone would stop.
Scott

i had one opportunity and didn't stop.  five cars pulled off the road in front of me.
a little CRX type car passed us and swerved and ran off the road and hit a concrete bridge abutment at over 80 mph.  he blew plastic, glass and and a tire on the road.  it totaly waisted the car.      
i did get on the phone and called 911.  we drove on for a minute and passed the ambulance going the other way.    

While you are thinking about yourself, remind yourself that there are "Good Samaritan" Laws established to prevent this.

Keep moving, theres nothing to see here...

So there are laws to protect good samaritans against civil suits eh? Riiight. Just like there are laws to protect law-abiding citizens from being harrassed by cops who know how to get away with harrassing you... sure... [LOL]

20 years ago I stopped and rendered assistance to a construction foreman who was T-Boned by a gravel truck doing 50mph.

It was a crunch, he was banged up and pinned in the wreck.
I crawled thru the glass and held him until the EMS/Police arrived.
They patched up my glass cuts after attending him and getting him into the ambulance.

I gave full contact info to the police.

Nobody ever called.....until he showed up at my door ACCUSING ME OF STEALING THE PAYROLL CASH THAT WAS IN HIS CAR!!!!!!

[red][b] Welcome to my world. [/red] [/b]

And people wonder why LEO's are so cynical.

Common occurence, no one will actually do anything to help someone else, even if it is a FREE 911 cell call.

Don't forget, there have been a lot of deaths recently in the DFW area for rendering aid. They get struck by idiots who won't slow down, get shot at (heard this was recently), etc.

Like I said, there is nothing for you to learn here. You established your priorities in your first post. We all understand you will be one of those driving by, perhaps the one giving the finger to those stopping to assist.

Booo hoo hoo!  Society is collapsing!  Everyone is a selfish asshole except for me!  Wow, you people are really negative.

I've been stranded on the side of the road several times and someone always stopped to help me.

Just this winter, I lost traction on the highway and had about 3 or 4 people stop within 5 minutes to offer help.  One guy had a 4wd pickup truck and a nylon strap that he used to pull my car out of the snow.

Another time I was off the road and a group of six people coming back from their bowling leauge spent about 1/2 hour helping me get my car out of the side of the road.

I think you people who are taking this one incident and saying it's a sign of the "moral decay" or whatever the trendy word is around here are blowing it out of proportion.

-Nick Viejo.

P.S. I always stop and help people when I can because I know I've been there before.  And kudos to the original poster who stopped when everyone else was whizzing on by.

My close friend an I saw a head on collision at night as I was approaching a highway on a perdindicular road.  One car was slowing to turn, both were distracted by some fireworks on the other side of the highway.  It was a hard hit, sparks, flying debris, antifreeze and oil all over the road.  This was about four years ago and the reason I got a cell phone.  Nobody was stopping to help, just watch.  When I got someone to stop luckily they had a phone.  They weren't planning on using it until I got to them.

In the larger car (Taurus) the driver was just bloodied up, his buddy had hit the windsheild and was out cold.  The young lady driving the other car, a Honda or Acura, was hurting.  Both legs shattered from the knees down and shoved under her seat.  She was insane with pain, trying to get out of the car, afraid she lost her baby.  Out comes the helicopter for the girl.  She never was pregnant but needed lots of surgery to ever walk again.

I did have an extinguisher and mag light in my car, and now always will have.

Paul, I know what you're talking about man.  I see a lot of people stopped on the side of the road with one kind of trouble or another, and I generally stop to ask if they need any help.  The thing that really ticks me off, is that this will be during rush hour or something, and thousands of cars are driving by and I never see anybody even look twice.  And this isn't on the freeway or anything, this is on roads with speed limits around 35 or 45 so it's no big deal to swing over to the shoulder and ask if they need some help.  

[b] I have found it is a situation where either no one stops, or every Tom Dick and Harry stops, mostly to see if anyone was decapitated.[/b]

indeed gentlemen...

my pet peeve are poeple honking behind a stalled or stranded car.  once i pulled alongside the car (blocking traffic) and helped pushe the car less than 1/2 plack into a gas station in 100+ degree heat.  i figured that hell my car had air conditioning and i wasnt going to die waiting and nither was anyone else, now the dude pushing the car by himself...

needless to say i pissed everyone off for my 60 seconds of aid, but the look on the guys face (im not sure if he spoke english) made the minimal effort worth it and made my A/C feel might cold when i jumped back in the car...

when it snows here in Dallas like it did last year, i admittedly like to hang out and watch stupid drivers take out street signs, jump curbs, sideswipe each other mainly beacuse they think that their 4wd SUV's are invincible...
but, when they get stuck, stupid as i think they may have been, i'll still help push them out of see if everyone is okay... why not? they are human beings with mothers and fathers, wives, husbands or sons and daughters. let us not forget that we are all stupid at some point in our lives and hope that others will treat us with the same compassion.  my girlfriend chided me for wanting to go watch the intersection nearest her house for "late braking idiots" she understood later when i had helped a few people off the curb reminding them to brake earlier than they thought and to go slower in their big SUV's...

Do unto others...

I have been nice and even helped people out, but all I have ever got in return is shit on.

Ahh... this is where your "cop logic and poor thinking" come into play.

I never said I wouldn't stop to help. In fact, I always do.

However, you sure know how to misinterpret something. Here's what I said, which was in relation to the original post about why *some* people don't stop to render aid:

Amen!!!!!!

I stop whenever assistence is needed.  

A couple years ago, on my way to work after a 4 inch snow, I came upon a city squad car on the highway, strobes lit, nose down in the ditch, and I knew the officer.  I attempted to pull over to see if she needed a hand, and slid right down in the ditch myself.  My 4x4 truck couldn't get out either.  She came over laughing at me and the shift sgt. had the tow truck yank me out gratis.....
 
The winter before last, I saw two wrecks in a three week time span.  The first one was kids in a Camaro trying to pass a Jeep Cherokee on a narrow country road in the snow.  They both wound up in the ditch.  Nobody hurt.  I left when the township PD arrived after advising him what I saw and that I was departing.
The second one was a high school aged couple in a new Ford Escort, driving too fast in snow/freezing rain.  She lost it and spun across the centerline, getting T-boned by an oncoming S-10 pickup, and sliding back into the ditch.
I pulled up 10 seconds behind, there were a couple people stopped and checking out the S-10, most people were just driving through.  Nobody was at the Escort yet, and it looked the most badly damaged (cheap piece of shit crumpled like a beer can), so I pulled over and headed down there.  The drivers side was pushed in at least 2 feet between the front and rear wheels.  All glass on that side gone.  Female driver approx 16-17. male passenger approx same age, neither with jackets on, and snow is piling into the interior of the car.  Both have belts on.  We are about 8 miles from the nearest volunteer EMS and the same distance from a hospital.  Female is unconscious, male coming to and beginning to panic, wanting to try and get out of the car, move the girl, etc (her head is in his lap).  I tried to talk to the male, he is very incoherent.  I managed to keep him from panicking and moving too much.  Meanwhile, another bystander is checking her out from the driver's side, she says the girl is still breathing, but doesn't want to check her pulse out due to the severity of the crash.  Neither victim is bleeding or displaying any gross emergency.  We agree it is best to try and keep them both still until help gets there.  At that point, the male puts his head back and tried to relax, I went around to the driver's side and shut off the lights and ignition in case there may be a fire risk.  
At this point, the first sheriff's deputy shows up, it has been 10-15 minutes since impact.  He checks out the male, and moves to the female.  While we were distracted by the officer, the female had stpped breathing.  He cuts her belt and literally drags her out into the snow, just as the first EMS arrives.  They work on her in the snow while some other personnel retrieve a stretcher.  The weather is too poor for a chopper.  A Watertown Paramedic unit arrives and they hustle the girl to it.  However, it doesn't leave for the hospital 8 miles down the highway, I take that as a bad sign.

Remaining EMS personnel get a backboard behind the male, turn him in the car, and slide him out onto a stretcher with the assistance of me and another bystander.  At that point, I am getting close to being late for work and both victims have been extracted, I went to talk to the deputy who is interviewing the other bystanders, he is to busy to be bothered and looks annoyed, so I left for work.

Departing the scene, one of the volunteer FD personnel says "hey, thanks for helping us out".  That suprised me for some reason.

Read in the paper the next day the girl was declared DOA at the Hospital of head/neck injuries.  Very sad.  

My car went into a snowy ditch ( immobilized ) and people stopped to see if we were ok.  And this was on a busy interstate in the mountains.

Actually, the best Christmas Eve I ever had, was because I pulled my truck over to help out a family that had broken down.
I was on a run from Texas to L.A. over Christmas week, and about 50 miles east of Albequerque(sp?), some guy got on his CB and told us to be careful, that there was a car on the right shoulder, and some guy was standing next to it (this was at around 1am). I said I was in no hurry, and would pull over to see what the deal was. Well, their car had broken down right before a bridge, so I had to pass by them, and pull off on the other side of the bridge. Man, let me tell you, it was fucking COLD that night (Gallup, NM reported a low of 39 below that night), and the road was covered with snow. I went back to the car, and it was a man, his wife, and their daughter on their way to Albequerque to visit family for Xmas. They had been sitting there for over 2 hours, and noone had stopped. Since I was going right through their destination (if I try to spell that city name again, I'm going to scream), I'd be more than happy to carry them in. The wifes' legs had gone numb with the cold, so I had to carry her to my rig. After the wife and daughter were settled in the sleeper, Me and the father went back, and got all their gifts, and put them in the truck. We stopped along the way, and he called his relatives to tell them what happened, called to arrange a tow-truck to come after their car the next day, and off we went. It took around 4 hours to make the 50 miles into (that city), and we pulled into a mall parking lot, found a phone, and they called their relatives. They had never even been up close to a big truck before, and they had the time of their lives, riding way up high. I mean they made a HUGE deal about it; ya shoulda seen 'em. They took pictures of the truck, me, me & the truck, them and the truck, lol. The relatives showed up and we got everything over into their car, and at some point, the father snuck a call to the hotel next to the mall, and reserved a room for me. I tried to get him to break it, that I intended on driving straight through to L.A., but he wouldn't let me. He also tried to PAY me for stopping. I just replied, "And what was I supposed to do; drive on by, and let you freeze to death? I wouldn't take his money. That was at around 5am, on Christmas Eve. Later, after a good nap, I woke up, and headed off, arriving at my parents' house Christmas night. That was the best christmas I've ever had.

People in general suck.  Sorry, but that is the truth of it.  I recently stopped to help a VERY pregnant woman who was stranded all alone with car trouble on a nice day, on a major highway - in the country.  When I stopped to help her, during conversation I asked how long she had been there.  Amost an hour!!  I went to get what she needed to be back on the road, was gone 30 minutes or so, and nobody stopped then either.  This includes any law enforcement people.  I asked her if she had seen any police cars, but she said no, which would be unusual for this area that I drive a lot.

On another quick note, I used to help out as a moderator on another board.  A member was having life threatening problems with his young son.  I suggested in an email that we all get together and pool a little money together to help him out with expenses and a little extra for fun.  A total of 3 out of HUNDREDS of people contributed anything.  You want to know how many people complained about "Spam"?  I lost count.  That was the only email I ever sent out like that because of the circumstances.  I no longer frequent that board or have anything to do with the people there.  They weren't "my kind" of people, and life is better!!  I have learned -

rant mode off - MOurnSword

(Had to vent)