If I am driving on a road, and a flying saucer with a spotlight is hovering ahead waiting to land, do I have to stop in the roadway and yield to them? Or do they have to yield to cars in the road? I checked my states driving manual and they don’t mention alien air/spacecraft at all.
I would guess that the UFO would have the right of way, as traffic would have to eventually stop for them anyways. Should I just stop in the roadway and put my hazards on so the flying saucer pilot is aware I am yielding the right of way to them?
I know it’s a joke question but here’s a serious answer:
I would treat it same as any other aircraft landing on the roadway. Give them space to do their thing because objects of greater potential energy ALWAYS have right of way, regardless of what liability laws say. Can’t sue ‘em if you’re dead.
As for laws, a quick search didn’t find anything in Federal or Alabama law about it except that the FAA here in the US says pilots consider it only as a last resort option due to safety concerns. If figure it’s probably not a common enough occurrence for laws to be made about it. Other states or counties may have something about it though.
I would imagine that legally, liability largely falls on the plane operator, though if you as a driver can avoid it, you would share in liability, perhaps moreso.
- Avoid things
- Then go by right-of-way
Sort of how you approach 3/4-way stop signs (god I hate them).
In my profession (trucking) the only thing that matters is preventable/nonpreventable. Liability is something for the insurance company to worry about (mostly).
This might be an interesting topic to suggest to Mike Rafi or Legal Eagle though.
But does the law give any rights to non human sentient extraterrestrial beings? If they are not a legal entity of any sort, this could lead to some interesting results.
Let’s say you ram into their ship, could anyone sue anyone? What if they evaporate your car with a doom laser cannon? Maybe that’s sort of like crashing your car into a rock, as far as blame is concerned.
A few general traffic laws apply:
1: The UFO is not a legally registered road vehicle and they must yield to all traffic.
2: If you see a hazardous situation, like the UFO not clearly following traffic laws giving you space, you must do your part to avoid injury by avoiding a collision.
So after you do brake for the UFO, or swerve and honk, you may go to the police and inform them of the aliens’ traffic violation. They may then get a fine.
If you say “fuck it Im in the right” and crash into them, you are both breaking the law, but you are in bigger trouble for willfully endangering life and property. You get prison, the aliens get a fine.
Your last sentence is the answer. Your driving manual probably says “drivers must yield to other vehicles occupying a lane”, which in your example would be a UFO.
The UFO is in the air in this case, preparing to make a vertical landing on the roadway
There’s a whole other section on defensive driving, I’m certain of it.
In this case, you’d be expected to exercise reasonable judgement on whether this UFO may be developing into a hazard. Four-ways on, and pull to the side of the road if it’s safe to do so.
In my state, defensive driving is optional (unless you get enough tickets/points that the course is mandated).
Speaking as a Voxon who captains a Kerglyz KG-7 scout craft (with the boosted manifold), I feel like I can offer an interesting viewpoint.
If we hover before landing it is a sign that we see you and are yelding to you, you can just pass under us, but please, to make it clear that you understand the situation and to alert us if we have strayed into your path inadvertetly, just flash your highbeams twice, indicating that you see us and intend to pass.
We are normally just doing surveys and gathering data, we are doing our best to stay out of the way.
I flash high beams twice to indicate the other road user may pass. Could we clarify this point before someone gets into another interplanetary insurance kerfuffle?
Thank you for your concern, as it stands now that local way of interaction between vehicles is at odds with the current galactic standard as noted in Book 29 (transportation), Chapter 61 (optical communication), section 5 (visual spectrum), subsection 2 (visual specturm communication between space faring civilizations and non space faring civilizations)
I will preset your comment as a suggestion to the grand court, who may agree to publish a local exception in Book 12 (exceptions).
The first rule of the road is “right-of-way won’t help you when you’re dead”.
