I LIVE near Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH) and often witness ambulances from the hospital speeding, always with emergency lights whirling, and sometimes, with the sirens on. Like most responsible motorists, I make way because I understand the urgency of a victim's need to receive treatment quickly. But I have found out since that speeding ambulances are not always on an emergency mission.
Twice, I followed these ambulances to their destinations. In the first instance, I followed a speeding ambulance, with its emergency signals on, to TTSH to see how seriously injured or ill the victim it was ferrying was.
I even paid the carpark charges to park my car at a hospital lot near the area where the ambulance drops off its patient, to ensure that I would not miss a thing.
To my surprise, the ambulance was not carrying any patient. I approached the driver, who was already reading the papers by then, and asked him why he had sped all the way from Ang Mo Kio Avenue 5, where I had spotted him, to the hospital when his ambulance was empty. He replied that the call to pick up a patient was cancelled along the way.
That may be so if he was heading out of the hospital. But the problem was, he was on his way back to the hospital.
On the second occasion last Friday afternoon, I spotted a van marked prominently as an ambulance and which was carrying elderly folk from Balestier Road. It made its way onto the CTE, sticking to the fast lane throughout, lights on its roof whirling, giving the impression that it was on an emergency mission.
Naturally, cars parted to make way. But it was clear that the van was not on an emergency mission as it was heading towards Yishun where there is no hospital. If there was no emergency, the ambulance should have stayed on the slow lane, as it is only a van. It would also have been safer for the elderly it was ferrying.
