Together with a drone deployment team, officers from Brandenburg’s traffic police carried out distance checks on trucks on A24 from 9am to 1.30pm on Tuesday.
The drone was used to monitor compliance with the minimum 50 metre distance rule, as well s the lorry overtaking ban on the A24.
During the 4 hours and 30 minutes the drone was in operation, 23 truck drivers were found guilty of breaking the minimum distance rule. Moreover, 8 others flouted the overtaking ban. In one instance, a truck driver from Serbia was found to be as close as 12 metres to the lorry in front.
The officers were then able to the identify the guilty parties and issue fines. According to Brandenburg Police’s press release, failure to keep to the law on minimum distance is punishable with an €80 fine.
The use of drones by the police to monitor lorry drivers is not unique to Germany. As we reported last year, police in Poland have used a drone to catch lorry drivers making illegal overtakes.
To illustrate how the drone can be used, the traffic police in Bydgoszcz released a video showing a HGV driver making an illegal overtake on another truck just before a pedestrian crossing. The incident happened on the DK 10 road, which links Warsaw with Szczecin.
In the video, a lorry driver is seen overtaking another truck just before a pedestrian crossing. The traffic police in Bydgoszcz described the maneuver as “very dangerous for pedestrians”.
Photo: Polizei Brandenburg