Have you ever witnessed a police car chase?

[3rdCuppa]

Seen a few.

One time was when I was crossing at a pelican crossing at an X junction and a boy racer jumped the red light. What he didn't notice was, there was a cop car pulling up to the junction to his right. The cop car turned its lights on straight away and zoom, the chase was on.

Another time was when I was in a shop. I heard the sound of sirens then looked out the window. The car being chased zoomed past, then a cop car zoomed past with lights flashing and sirens blazing, then another whooshed past, then another .... and another. Why there were four cop cars ... I don't know.

 

[Gromit]

4 cars. To box the other car in. They demonstrated the technique on Top Gear.

If you chase with just one car all you effectively do is follow till they crash or run out of petrol. Which leaves a dangerous person on the road for longer and more chance of some innocent third party getting hurt.

 

[dylanredefined]

Been in a car chase it was a great buzz .Well we chased a couple of oil tankers down in landrovers so guess not high speed . But it was dark and roads were narrow .Guess if you handed that scenario over to police to risk assess they would curl up in a ball and cry .Fortunatly no one got hurt .

Isnt the police idea now to minimise chases .Use a helicopter and pick them up when the the idiots crash or ditch the car .

 

[detective-boy]

Why there were four cop cars ... I don't know.

Cos the others hadn't joined in yet ...

Despite many of the posts here, significant pursuits (i.e. more than a couple of lefts and rights) are rare and so drivers like to get themselves involved. Controllers are now pretty strict about keeping the numbers of vehicles involved down (in the olden days they would frequently gather a tail of 10 or more assorted vehicles as they wandered round London ... ) but usually they would leave assigned at least three or four (to cover the need for one to stop and deal with any collisions caused, to ensure sufficient officers were present to chase / secure an area on foot if the occupants decamped, to deal with any violence offered and, in exceptional circumstances, to carry out a tactical hard stop).

 

[detective-boy]

Isnt the police idea now to minimise chases .Use a helicopter and pick them up when the the idiots crash or ditch the car .

Yes. But the helicopter is not always available and it doesn't help in gathering discarded evidence, etc. Even if it IS available, ground units will still be utilised to shadow the suspect vehicle, cover potential decamp sites, etc.