Side-by-side on a highway at 3:00 a.m. That seems perfectly normal.

Just maybe the RCMP thought it a little strange someone out riding at 3:00 am and it might even crossed their mind that the atv was stolen and as part of their job they could ask it to stop so they could ask for proof of ownership.

They could have been on their way home….doesn’t matter. Ramming an ATV or even another vehicle is using deadly force. Any reasonable person would have foreseen that ramming the people was potentially lethal. Was it warranted?

The vehicle was used as a weapon and should be investigated as such.

“The vehicle was used as a weapon and should be investigated as such”

Ever occur to you that it was accidental? Don’t know where you folks got the info that the cruiser rammed the ATV.

“had the RCMP not chased them maybe they would not be injured at this point”
Had they not been out breaking the law at 3am maybe they wouldnt be injured at this point either

So, instead of assuming just because they were out at 3am they were up to no good, perhaps they were getting out into complete darkness to enjoy the meteor shower that is happening and is close to its peak time. As for everything else, well, you wont know until you get all the details just hope and pray that the passenger makes it through quickly and safely :)

“So, instead of assuming just because they were out at 3am they were up to no good, perhaps they were getting out into complete darkness to enjoy the meteor shower that is happening and is close to its peak time.”

Oh please. Any ATV that is travelling on the road is breaking the law… period.

‘Oh please. Any ATV that is travelling on the road is breaking the law… period.’

Were you there? were any of you there? do you know these people? DO you know if they were on the road for a fact? and FYI it is NOT illegal to operate on the road ways.

Operation of an all terrain vehicle
4 (1) A person must not operate an all terrain vehicle

(a) in a careless, reckless or negligent manner so as to endanger or cause injury or damage to a person or property of another,
(b) in a tree nursery or planting, in a manner that may damage or destroy growing stock,
(c) on the tracks of an operating railway,
(d) on private property without the consent of the owner, lessee or occupant of it,
(e) in such a manner as to drive, harass, chase, run over, injure or kill wildlife or a domestic animal, or
(f) in areas, seasons or periods of time prohibited by the regulations.
(2) An operator must, on request of the owner or occupant of property on which he or she is found, stop and identify himself or herself and produce for inspection his or her certificate of registration, and must promptly, on request, leave that property.
(3) Unless he or she holds a valid and subsisting driver’s licence issued under the Motor Vehicle Act, a person must not operate an all terrain vehicle on or across a highway as defined in the Transportation Act or on any portion of the right of way of a highway
(a) except as authorized by a permit prescribed by the regulations, or
(b) except as authorized by bylaw of a municipality,
and unless he or she complies in all respects with those provisions of the Motor Vehicle Act that are made applicable by regulation, and the instructions and directions of an enforcement officer.
(4) The council of a municipality may pass bylaws, consistent with this Act and the regulations, regulating, governing or prohibiting the operation of all terrain vehicles in the municipality or on highways that are solely under the jurisdiction of the municipality.
(5) This section is subject to restrictions and prohibitions prescribed by the Park Act, the Forest Act or the Land Act or in any regulations made under those Acts.
Equipment

take from the MOTOR VEHICLE (ALL TERRAIN) ACT BC

Any Lights on this thing, Sunrise was around
5am, so must have been kind of dark, never mind not to be on any Road. This will only get worse , I see little Kids riding them on our Road and even on Blackwater. I think it is around $ 500 plus getting towed from the Spot having no Insurance, but you got to have Fun and the Rule don’t apply to you!

“and FYI it is NOT illegal to operate on the road ways.”
As long as you have insurance. Without insurance it IS illegal. And since these machines do not have proper equipment (turn signals, morrors, horn etc) then they are impossible to insure for use on public roads. THAT is in the motor vehicle act too if you care to paste the whole story. Bottom line, they were breaking the law.

ummmmmm do you drive one of these as we ride them and we have all of those item on ours.

You know bottom line is that people are making poor assumptions about something they don’t have all the facts to. I know if this was one of my family members i would find all these comments very rude and disrespectful. as for your comment interceptor ‘if you care to paste the whole story.’ for your reading pleasure. You all have the choice of hand signals as they are very legal! there is nothing in the act specific to signals horn ect. and to the best of my knowledge they ALL come equipped with a horn.

5 (1) A person must not operate an all terrain vehicle unless the all terrain vehicle is equipped as prescribed by the regulations.

(2) Subsection (1) does not apply to organized races or similar competitive events held
(a) on private property with the permission of the owner, lessee or custodian of the property, or
(b) on government property with the permission of the director.

Looks like we hit a Nerve here.

Sassy, unless you have license plate on the Utv with all the items listed by interceptor, then it is against the law. Maybe this Utv had all the bells an whistles, but it’s highly unlikely. Let’s not speculate who ran who off the road. It amazes me that things haven’t changed since the introduction of the IIO. People are going to blame the cop for trying to stop someone from committing a crime, the job he or she is sworn to do. Let’s just see what the IIO have to say when their investigation is concluded in let’s say………6 months.

Outwest no nerves were hit at all…. although some may wish there had been. It is a debate and freedom of speech and each person is subject to voicing their own opinion and thoughts.I take no hard feelings at all in forums as I do not know these other people at all they are just word of their thoughts types into a computer.

Uppercanadian, you are saying it highly unlikely … again do you know these people? Can you be certain? So many judge in such a negative way without even having even more than 25% of the actual details. It is very easy to react when you don’t have all the information isn’t it? If you want to be an officer or investigator than be one instead of speculating on the negatives of what you may or may not think happened. Yes it is freedom of speech yes this is for opinion of mind however, there has been a tragedy here and everyone is very quick to blame and at no point is there even suggestion that the drive of the ATV is at fault. Guess only time will tell…..
As for our men and woman of the force I do have the utmost respect for them but lets face it, we all make mistakes and accidents are just that…. accidents.

signing off……

motor vehicles are NOT permitted on public roadway without proper registration and insurance.

I have inquired with a few insurance agents, and even though many of these machines do come with horn, doors, signal lights, seat belts and windshield, one cannot insure these vehicles for LEGAL road use in BC.

The only acceptable road use is a crossing, and technically, the operator is supposed to shut off the machine and push.

No riding in the ditch, no riding done the shoulder, not supposed to be on the road.

Has anyone ever read the owners manual for an ATV or a UTV?

They are both vehicles outfitted with balloon tires that are intended to operate with a low tire pressure of around 5 to 6 psi. The reason is that it gives them great handling ability on the terrain they are meant to be used on. Paved roads are typically not considered to fall under the description of “terrain”. Think about it.

So, the typical owners manual will give several warnings about what not to do.

Typically, the very first one is pavement. Here is an example.

http://www.kymcousa.com/owners/offroad/UXV500.pdf

With that particular one they even warn about the so-called roll cage … that it is not strong enough to be legally considered as a protective device.

I could not copy from the above linked manual. Here are the words from another manual

“This UTV is designed and manufactured for OFF-ROAD use only.

“It is illegal and unsafe to operate this UTV on any public street, road or highway.

“This UTV complies with all applicable OFF-ROAD noise level and spark arrester laws and regulations in effect at the time of manufacture.

“Please check your local riding laws and regulations before operating this UTV.”

We appreciate you signing off sassy. My blood pressure can now return to a normal range.

Sassy: “accidents are just that…. accidents.”

Most ‘accidents’ are completely preventable. If people employed their common sense, there would be a whole lot less of them.

Gus, you are micro analyzing this without having the vital crucial simple facts associated with this matter. All those regulations don’t amount to a hill of beans if they are ignored!

gus: “Has anyone ever read the owners manual for an ATV or a UTV?”

I’m guessing that most ATV/UTV owners don’t read it. If they do, they just ignore the parts that they think don’t apply.

The amount of speculation here is incredible. I hope that as a result of the investigation the police are given more tools to deal with these people that insist on endangering our roadways ( not implying they in this case were, except for the fact they WERE on Friday road. I can hear50kmh( and see) those vehicles flying past my house at WELL over the posted speed limit of 50kmh, sometimes well over double that…..many times I could have hit, or been hit by one.

so typical of our society today! It’s all too often a case of “It’s not my fault!!”

Nobody seems willing to accept the results of their actions, instead choosing to pass blame onto others or lay fault where fault doesn’t lay.

My mother always said that if you are going to play with fire, don’t be surprised if you get burned. If you are going to break the law, don’t be surprised if you get arrested and punished.

If you are going to drive an ATV or a UTV on a public highway, or park it on a public highway without lights on to watch a meteor show (???), then just be thankful that you don’t have a run in with a fully loaded tractor-trailer unit!

Uppercanadian – “We appreciate you signing off sassy. My blood pressure can now return to a normal range” – you really ought to get that looked at… doesn’t sound good. These conversations are not personal so one should not get a raise blood pressure…

“Most ‘accidents’ are completely preventable. If people employed their common sense, there would be a whole lot less of them”– very true key word though MOST

I have no brought up any of these defenses except to make people think. YOU were not there YOU do not have all the details but yet everyone is so quick to judge the driver of the side by side. You don’t know if they had lights on, you don’t know if they were drinking, you don’t know anything about the situation except that of what the media has released. Now thinking back to accidents in the past, they have always let the media know if the drive has been sited on the spot for drinking and drive ect. that is not the case from what we know at all. Perhaps the side by side was crossing the road and not driving on the road? Maybe the RCMP had his lights off? bottom line is no one really knows what happened but what we do know is that there is someone in the hospital hurt and we don’t even know how badly. Someone possible is looking at losing a parent or a child. Not everyone who uses ATV vehicles uses them inappropriately same as people who drive on out streets are not always safe either.

We all live in the north and there are a lot of ATV, Dirt-bikes and other off road vehicles that surround us. Not everyone uses them appropriately however, you cannot always jump to the conclusion that every person who jumps on one is ARSES or what have you. A lot of minds might change should it be found that the RCMP were at fault. look at the picture and explain why the skid marks are slanted coming from the side of the road?? food for thought

“look at the picture and explain why the skid marks are slanted coming from the side of the road?? food for thought”

Skid marks? I do not see a single skid mark. Where are they in relation to the tires where the police cruiser is positioned next to the orange location marks.

There are more than 5 separate shadows perpendicular to the road direction from vegetation to the left of the picture.

Perhaps you mean those, sasssay?

Cop car on the wrong side of the road may have been trying to stop the atv. Those rigs do not stop very well on pavement may have slid into the car.

I may also add the atv may have lost control trying to avoid the car.

Maybe it was their new side by side atv that’s why the IIO were called, just thinking?? training operation gone bad?

There was an accident on highway 97 south on the hill leaving the bcr site many years ago where the south bound police cruiser went from the outside lane to the inside lane to force a north bound motorcyclist who was going down the hill illegally passing vehicles by driving around them in the inside south lane. The motorcyclist died and not sure what happened to the officer.

As far as I’m concerned the ATV had no right to be there. The driver of the ATV should be charged under the motor vehicle act for driving without insurance. Sounds like you want to ignore the facts Sassay. The cops did nothing wrong!

It is so interesting to read all these comments, especially the “anti-ATV” ones.
Lots of surmising, a great deal of guesses (some not too educated ones), but everyone seems to have a verdict without any of the facts.
Who knows? Maybe it was the cop car that went out of control and hit the ATV on the side? I know, I know, that seems way off the mark, but as no one who is posting here knows, why not let the situation resolve with the facts?
Just as an example, I read with some interest here all the “guilty verdicts” different posters had about a trucker whose logging truck rolled a couple years ago up by Nukko Lake. Guess what? When the investigation was done and it went to court, the POLICE were reprimanded by the judge and the case was thrown out of court. The driver wasn’t going too fast, etc., and the cops laid a spurious charge.
My point is simply that making up one’s mind without all the facts is not a sign of intelligence.