Do you drive too fast?
After a few years of Norwegian holidays for most of us, very many will have to holiday abroad again this year. Finally.
We have been looking forward to this! But it is not important to be too heavy on the gas foot in the euphoria of finally coming abroad, with fine, wide and straight roads – on the way to southern latitudes.
Then the European tour can be completed in Denmark. Very abrupt and brutal, too. Because if you are caught for what the Danish self calls “Madness driving”, you do not just get fined, or lose your driver’s license. Which, of course, made the video an overnight sensation.
No, here too the car, or motorcycle, can simply be seized – on the spot – and sold at auction. The money from the sale goes straight into the Danish treasury.
Quite new
A new piece of legislation that allows this came into force on 31 March last year.
– We have come to a point where we saw ourselves having to do something with the pig driving. These are people who lose their lives because someone else is driving like idiots.
Christian Berthelsen, spokesman for the National Traffic Center of the National Police, told Danmarks Radio when the new rules were adopted.
The Danes do not risk empty threats and loose talk at all. Already to months after the regulations came into force, it had been coated on more than 100 vehicles. Since then, it has been balleting further.
Most recently last week, a motorcyclist could just forget that someone gets their motorcycle back. He was measured at 250 km / h outside Copenhagen.
Another man in his 50s lost his leased Ford Mondeo, on May 3, after being caught at 107 km / h in an urban zone where the speed limit is 50 km / h.
How many vehicles have been seized, we have not been able to obtain any figures, but we are talking about several hundred in total.
Also read: One thing you should not do after spreading your hands …
Three criteria
It is basically three different criteria for the police to seize vehicles on the spot.
1: If you drive twice as fast as the speed limit, or over it – and the speed is more than 100 km / h. In practice, this means that you do not lose the car if you drive at 80 km / h in a 40-zone. But if a man drives at 120 km / h in a 60-zone, then it moves …
2: Whether you drive at 200 km / h, or more, no matter how high the speed limit on site is. Maximum speed limit in Denmark is 130 km / h
3: If you have more than 2.0 per mille. The Danes have a blood alcohol limit of 0.5.
In addition to this, separate rules apply if rough driving or other pig driving, for example “Burnouts”, leads to something or someone being either injured or killed.
Also read: This is how the lorry drivers tried to lure into Norway
Not in Norway
The Danish scheme has not been without challenges. Both ethical and legal. In some cases where the vehicle has been seized, it is not the owners themselves who have been driven, but the vehicle has been lent to others. This has created loud discussions, without this, so far, having brought about any changes.
According to our experience, there are no plans to introduce a similar system with fittings – and sale of vehicles here in Norway.
Also read: Admitted that the driver’s license was fake – wait until you hear the explanation
Video: Join a tour inside this police car