Yellowknife (Mar 10/03) - It's 8:20 a.m. Wednesday at the fire hall and Lieut. Chucker Dewar has covered the boardroom dry erase board in red ink.

He's using diagrams to illustrate the proper procedure drivers should use when reacting to emergency vehicles.

What to do when the lights go on The NWT Motor Vehicle Act says drivers must yield the right of way to any emergency vehicle by immediately clearing an intersection, moving to the right on a two way road and stopping and remaining in that position until the vehicle has passed. The general procedure is to put your right signal on, slow down and pull over to the right side of the road. Fire department Lieut. Chucker Dewar says to just use common sense and follow the normal rules of the road. If you are in the left lane, move to the right lane with caution. Firefighters try to travel in the left lane down the highway and will only change lanes as a last resort. If there is no room on the right shoulder proceed slowly until you can find room and pull over. If you are approaching an intersection, slow down and try to park on the right side of the road. Don't go through the intersection. Turn right with caution if you have to. If you are stopped at an intersection, put your signal on and turn right. Do not wait for the light to turn green. If you are in the left lane, take the above steps but use caution and be aware of any cars beside or behind you.

"Always put your signal on, make sure it's safe and pull over to the right," he explains in a few pen strokes.

Too many Yellowknife drivers are either ignoring emergency vehicles or reacting inappropriately to them, Dewar says. That could mean all the difference in saving a home, a building or even a life.

The 17-year veteran of the city's fire department starts to explain the procedure for bottlenecked intersections when the classroom meeting is cut short. His radio bleats a warning and the dispatcher calls for a crew to pick up a patient at Aven Manor for a medevac south.

"Grab your stuff and I'll show you first hand," he says as he dashes out the door.

Less than a minute later, the supervisor is racing down Franklin Avenue with his vehicle's lights flashing and siren blaring. The first two cars he comes across move to the side but don't stop. A sport utility vehicle in the right lane speeds up a little but doesn't pull over. The vehicle carries on down Franklin and as he turns left into the retirement home, Dewar shakes his head.

"There you go," he says. "That guy could have caused a situation if we had to turn right there."

He says even saving 30 seconds in response time can be crucial. In that time, a lot can happen, he said, giving the example of a house fire, where flames can increase by a factor of seven every five minutes.

"We can get anywhere in Yellowknife within five to eight minutes of receiving a call," he says. "Sure, a few seconds can be a life-and-death issue."

Dewar said following proper procedure can also ensure the safety of not only members of his fire squad but other drivers on the road.

To illustrate, he grabbed a newspaper clipping tacked to the bulletin board in the staff room. The Feb. 28 news story out of Quebec which described a crash between a fire truck and an SUV that didn't yield. It killed the firefighter, a father of three; the SUV driver was hospitalized with serious injuries.

Firefighters report the worst offenders to the police, who often issue a warning.

Doug Gillard, manager of municipal enforcement, says his department has charged people in the past for not yielding to emergency vehicles and may step up charges if things don't improve in Yellowknife.

Drivers who don't yield to emergency vehicles can receive demerit points on their driver's licence. They can also be fined and summoned to court.

Yellowknife's 16 full-time firefighters work simultaneously as paramedics, so they will operate both the ambulances and fire trucks on any given shift. Firefighters Jason Clarke and Ed Hardy, who drove the ambulance to the medevac, agreed that other drivers need to learn proper protocol.

"I've had people floor it when it would have been very easy to just pull over and stop," says Clarke.

"You get people who lock their brakes and slide sideways and really create a situation," says Hardy, who notes it gets worse in the winter with foggy windshields and clouds of ice fog reducing visibility.

The Yellowknife fire department received 3,300 calls last year. The majority of calls involve a medevac and Dewar guessed that 10 to 15 per cent involved a life-threatening situation.