In Oregon last year, an ambulance hit a cyclist. The kind relief service picked him up and took him to the hospital, but they charged me $2,000 for the trip.
An Oregonian story says that 71-year-old cyclist William Hoesch was out riding in Rainer, Oregon, in October 2022. By chance, he was riding in the same way as a Columbia River Fire & Rescue ambulance. The lawsuit that Hoesch filed on October 24 says that the ambulance hit him and destroyed his bike when it tried to make a right turn. It so happened that the accident happened right in front of the medical station. Hoesch and the ambulance driver have different ideas about how fast the ambulance was going when it hit him:
Even though the paramedics took him to the closest hospital for free, they charged him $1,862 for the ride. In addition to the $47,000 he already owes for hospital bills, Hoesch and his lawyers say he will have to pay another $50,000 in future bills because of his injuries. Even though the crash wasn’t very fast, Hoesch was badly hurt, especially for a man in his seventies; he broke his nose and had “scrapes and other injuries across his body.”
Hoesch is now claiming and wants $997,000 for pain and suffering. He says the accident hurt him in a way that won’t go away, and it has made his hands less flexible and less able to hold things firmly. Lawyers for Hoesch are saying that the “damages that Columbia River Fire & Rescue is unable to cover” should be covered by his Allstate insurance for drivers who aren’t protected or don’t have enough insurance. Allstate and Columbia River Fire & Rescue both declined to say anything about the case.
The Oregonian says that crashes involving ambulances happen all the time in the Beaver State. Kelsey Seibel, 25, was killed by an ambulance that turned left in front of her car in January 2024. In October, her family sued the ambulance company for $6 million. One more ambulance hit and killed Gearldean Marin, 55, who was sitting in a car on the side of the road with a flat tire in July. The Oregonian reports that no one has been sued for that event.
Source: Ambulance Hits Cyclist Then Charges Him $1,800 For Trip To The Hospital
