Why are European police/fire/ambulance lights blue?

[Hail Ants]

In the spirit of Cecil's "Why we drive on the right" column (still my personal favorite) I'd like to know why British & European police, ambulance and firetruck lights are blue instead of red? There has to be more than the "that's just how they do it there" reason because blood red is hard wired in humans as an alert & danger signal. British warships don't go on "blue alert" do they?

It seems especially strange to Americans because here a blue light means either a volunteer fireman or a sale at Kmart!

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I for one welcome our new insect overlords... - K. Brockman

[Bluepony]

No, blue lights mean "Police" or "Deputy Sheriff" over here too. Trust me on this one. :)

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...send lawyers, guns, and money...

Warren Zevon

[Sunspace]

Where I live, a single flashing blue light means "snow removal vehicle", and ONLY "snow removal vehicle". I don't remember whether any other emergency and service vehicles have blue lights along with lights of other colours... most fire trucks, etc, I remember had red and white flashing lights and strobes, and towtrucks, etc, have rotating yellow lights.

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Rigardu, kaj vi ekvidos.

[EvilGhandi]

In Hawaii, blue lights are reserved for police vehicles and ONLY police vehicles.

If you are caught with ANY blue light, flashing or non, wired into you car, you will be charged with impersonating an officer.

In the past most (Hawaii) patrolmen used their own vehicles. A few psychos capitalised on this and abducted women by using blue lights to pull them over.

The law is taken VERY seriously.

[Jorge]

Depends where you are. Some permutation of blue and/or red are the usual colors anywhere. State (or provincial, or national laws) set uo the specifications.

California requires a steady red 360 degree light, with others (wag lights, blue strobe, etc... optional). Most marine patrols are flashing blue, etc, etc...

[mangeorge]

In the past most (Hawaii) patrolmen used their own vehicles.
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I remember that, Evil, from when I was there in the late 60's. Not fair. :)
I also remember cab drivers using their own vehicles too. Cadillacs and such. Do they still?
Peace,
mangeorge

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I only know two things;
I know what I need to know
And
I know what I want to know
Mangeorge, 2000

[Hail Ants]

I live in NY state and the only people who use blue lights here are volunteer firemen. And I don't think there's any law restricting the use of either blue or yellow lights. But you cannot have ANY red lights pointing forward. A friend of mine had an old beat-up toyota pickup with a missing front turn signal lens and he taped a red lens over the bare bulb. He got a ticket for it. The cop even said, "So, you think you're the police?"!

Okay, so now I know what other meaning blue lights can have in America. I still want to know why Europe & Britain use blue strobes for all their emergency vehicles.

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I for one welcome our new insect overlords... - K. Brockman

[TomH]

Speculation:

Blue is not used for anything else whereas red, amber and green are used in traffic lights. If you see a blue light on the British roads, it can only be an emergency vehicle.

The colour blue has always been associated with the police in this country. They have always worn blue uniforms and police stations were until recently designated by a blue lamp outside [the film in which Dixon of Dock Green first appeared was called The Blue Lamp]. It would have seemed natural, when police cars were first introduced, to give than lights which were blue, rather than any other colour.

There has to be more than the "that's just how they do it there" reason because blood red is hard wired in humans as an alert & danger signal.

Do you have any proof for this claim?

[Iyamity]

I spend a lot of time on the roads, in an area where I get to see both red flashing lights, from emergency vehicles, and blue flashing lights from snowplows. IMO, the blue flashers can be seen from a greater distance, especially on days when visibility is low. Perhaps this greater visibilty is why they're used in Europe.

[mr john]

Emergency vehicles in Dallas use have blue along with the red . State law requires the red,with no red to the front for us civvies. Blue and white and yellow is local option. If you've ever seen them at night, hopefully somewher to the front, you know that the blue is the first you see, lot's more visible than red, and like tom sez you KNOW what it is.Combine several colors rotating at different speeds and it is real hard to say " buh officuh i din't, hic, din't,hic, see the lights"

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"Pardon me while I have a strange interlude."-Marx

[EvilGhandi]

Mangeorge,

Yep but not as much. Now it's kind of a perk to officers with more time on the beat. They have recently started letting them patrol in minivans and SUV types. That sucks as my brain has yet to make a Jeep=cop connection.

Dunno bout cabs. I see a bunch that are regular sedans with lights on em, most lemos are owned by the operators I hear.

[upstatic]

Why are American police/fire/ambulance lights not blue?

I could answer this for you but it all goes back to the days prior to the Revolution. Once upon a time there was a newly arrived pilgrim, he was all pissed off at Europe and the fact that it was a bitter, mean place to live...

I could go on all night.

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R.J.D.

[Moonshine]

i have to second Tomh and Iamity on this one, blue has traditionally been the colour of lights for the emergency services because red denoted a general hazard, such as a stop light or alarm, and this has become fixed with legislation probhibiting anybody other than the three services using that colour. The reason originally was very likely that blue can be seen from further away than red.

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It only hurts when I laugh.

[AWB]

One police jurisdiction here in Northern Virginia (not sure which one) is very patriotic. Their light array atop their cruisers are red, white, and blue.

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Wrong thinking is punished, right thinking is just as swiftly rewarded. You'll find it an effective combination.

[Nickrz]

The Chicago Police Dept. has always used blue MARS lights atop their vehicles - haven't you ever seen The Blues Brothers?

[Hail Ants]

TomH:
because blood red is hard wired in humans as an alert & danger signal.

Do you have any proof for this claim?

Proof? Are you kidding? Dump a bucket of blue, yellow or green paint on yourself and take a stroll. Other than thinking it a bit odd people won't care. But use red paint and absolutely 100% of people will not only notice you but most will approach you to see if you're dying.

And I don't see how anyone could possibly mistake a flashing and/or revolving red strobe for a steady red stop light.

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I for one welcome our new insect overlords... - K. Brockman

[StarvinMarvin]

Heres the lighting code:

Blue: any law enforcement agent

Orange: paid by tax payers or homeowners- utility

Red: any emergency vehicle

yellow: biological/chemical hazard emergency vehicle-federal paid

white: attention flashers

hence:

highway and sheriffs have red, yellow, blue
they are a TAX PAYER funded, emergency vehicle, with law enforcement power

ambulance (owned by private comp) red and white, its an attention grabbing emergency vehicle

Ambulance-Fire Dept Owned, add orange to the above as it is a county tax payer paid utility

Fire trucks (see above)

Utility trucks- orange, county tax payer paid

fire marshal- red orange

swat- yellow, orange, red, blue

hazmat- yellow and red

NuBiChem teams- yellow and white

SEE I DID MY HOMEWORK!

[Hail Ants]

StarvinMarvin, great list. Things more or less seem to follow it.

But doesn't Britain use blue for all emergency vehicles, i.e. police, fire & EMTs? If so, why did they choose blue over red?

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I for one welcome our new insect overlords... - K. Brockman

[TomH]

But doesn't Britain use blue for all emergency vehicles, i.e. police, fire & EMTs? If so, why did they choose blue over red?

Yes, we do. Given that the rules governing behaviour towards an emergency vehicle (i.e. you pull over to the left and slow down or stop to let it pass) do not discriminate between different types of vehicle, it is simpler to have one signal (flashing blue light) for all of them. You don't need to know whether it's a police car, ambluance or fire engine.

BTW, I saw the film Hard Rain the other night. The police vehicles in that have blue flashing lights, though I'm not sure where in the USA it's set.

use red paint and absolutely 100% of people will not only notice you but most will approach you to see if you're dying.

Blood is red, yes. Your point is ... ?

[Homer]

My friends, back in our halycon days, wanted black strobe lights in their cars. We flagged down a cop and spoke to him, and he said that in Missouri, you can have a strobe of any color save red in your vehicle. As long as it is INSIDE the vehicle, NOT pointing directly out the windshield, and not bright enough to blind, you would not be pulled over for it. Don't know how true this is, but my friends got their damned bulbs, and weren't ever pulled over for them.

Around here, on cops, they have red, blue, white, and yellow bulbs on their roofs, blue and red in their windshield and rear window, and every single light rotates or blinks at different rates. But the frightning part is, their headlights, brights, turn signals, hazards, and brakelights, reverse lights, and taillights also flash, at different rates. Does anyone else think it's a hazard for a cop to be following someone at night with his brights and dims strobing?

Finally, I've heard that it is illegal for cops to have fog lights. This seems to hold up, in that I've never seen a cop car with a strobe. Valid?

--Tim

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We are the children of the Eighties. We are not the first "lost generation" nor today's lost generation; in fact, we think we know just where we stand - or are discovering it as we speak.

[Nickrz]

My friends, back in our halycon days, wanted black strobe lights in their cars. This I gotta see.

[Hail Ants]

TomH:

Am I missing something? Because it's the color of blood, humans react to red as a warning, danger etc. signal. That's what I meant by it being "hard wired".

Cecil mentions this in his column about the development of traffic lights from railroad signals (green used to be white/clear until one day the red lense fell out and caused a crash).

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I for one welcome our new insect overlords... - K. Brockman

[TomH]

Hail Ants,

No, you're not missing anything. I just disagree with your assertion. The reasons are:

(1) Blood is red. Roses are red. Cardinals and robin's breasts are red. My mouse mat is red. The England football (soccer) team's alternate strip is red. Do you respond to all these things in the same way? (OK, you haven't seen my mouse mat, but you get the point.)

(2) The term "hard wired" suggests (to me at least) that our reaction to the colour red is innate (i.e. not learned). I have yet to see any proof of this.

(3) I respond in a particular way to a flashing blue light. This is, I assume, because I am British and I have learned from a very young age that a flashing blue light means "emergency services". I suspect that the way you respond to a flashing red light is similar to the way a respond to a blue one. This is because you are American and have learned that a flashing red light means "emergency services".

I am suggesting that it is the colours used in lights (green = go; blue or red = emergency; amber = caution, etc.) which determine our responses to them and not vice versa.

[TomH]

That's "robins' breasts". I didn't mean to give the impression of one mutant, multi-breasted robin.

[phouka]

(lifting collar and looking)

Nope. Two of them, more a pinkish-tan color than red. Everything seems to be in order.

(You see, my name is "Robin", and . . . oh, never mind. I know it's lame.)

[Hail Ants]

TomH:

To explore this further, are warning lights (low oil, high temp etc.) blue in British cars? I'm not being sarcastic, I genuinely don't know.

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I for one welcome our new insect overlords... - K. Brockman

[TomH]

Hail Ants,

Fair question. AFAIK, they all fall into the red-orange part of the spectrum.

Blue is, as I said, reserved for emergency vehicles.

[DVous Means]

I'm an ambo in Australia, hence this topic caught my immediately.

We use red and blue lights on our vehicles and a red/white/blue chaser above the front windscreen. The combination of colours was decided after field testing of how best to attract attention of other motorists.

It was found that a combination of red and blue was the best solution and was quickly adopted by all emergency services.

From my experience, red is good at night, whereas blue seems to be more "piercing" durign daylight hours.

The biggest problem isn't the colour of the lights - it's the drivers with tunnel vision who are cocooned in their air-conditioned cars with radio turned up, who just never hear the siren or see the lights because they don't use their mirrors....

[Hail Ants]

DVous Means:

To take this thread on a different tack:

Does Australia use the British/European wah-woh (sorry) siren or the gradual up & down American one? Anyone know why they're different? Was the American style one reserved for air raids in the UK?

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I for one welcome our new insect overlords... - K. Brockman

[KCB615]

httThe way I had had the siren thing explained to me is that the British "siren" is just two alternating horns of different pitch. The "American" siren is a real siren, a motor driven device turning a fan-like structure at high speed to make the whining sound. The faster it spins, the higher pitch the noise. Thus, as the motor winds up, the pitch gets higer. When the motor winds down, the pitch gets lower, giving the wind-up/down sound. After electronic sirens were developed, they made them sound like the sirens that were already around. Don't reinvent the wheel, after all.

BTW, most American emergency vehicles with electronic sirens have the "hi-lo" capability. I personally don't use it since A) you have to twist the dial all the way around to get it to "hi-lo", and
B) man that sound gets aggrivating after a few minutes (my apologies to those of the UK
contingent).

Just a little bit about a real American siren, the Federal Q2. It what everyone thinks of as a real fire engine siren: http://www.fedsig.com/fire/products/sirens/qsiren/index.html


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Jeremy....

Nobody ever calls me after they've done something smart.

[JRDelirious]

Just for the heck of it:

Around here in SJ the strobe colors are:
Blue or Blue+White: Commonwealth police -- including the official police-driven vehicles of the governor and top officials.

Green+Blue(+White optional): Municipal police (Metropolitan); Court Marshalls

Green: Municipal police (non-metro); Natural Resources Rangers; Corrections (prisoner transport); Mayor's car

Red or Red+White: Fire or ambulance

Red/Orange: ambulance

Orange+green: Civil Defense

plain orange: utility, private security, tow trucks, meter maids


The Commonwealth police have an annoying habit of just cruising around with their strobes on which is nervewracking to recent arrivees.

[Spiny Norman]

Off topic, but what the heck:

I'm not convinced that red is a hard-wired alert signal, but I might believe that black/yellow "wasp-style" stripes are. I've noticed that this colour combination is used on things that definitely shouldn't be used without prior consideration - ejector seat handles come to mind. Does anyone know if there's any psychological background to this ?

Norman