Police Car damaged driving on Arena Ice...

[mark]

Yes it happened. Who can remember it ?

The Steelers organised a fan event in the arena many years ago, as part of the event a police range rover was supposed to appear at the Zamboni entrance with it's blue lights and sirens on while Nicky Chinn was on the ice, Nicky having a bit of a reputation in those days for "problems with authority" (this is all based on memory which is now fading so my apologies if some names get mixed up, I wanted to write this before it fades completely) . If the police driver had stuck to the script that would have been the end of the story but of course it wasn't. The driver, an otherwise highly respected officer took it into his head to drive onto the ice and make his way down the side past the team benches, around halfway down I thought to myself "he's going a bit quick", I mean he wasn't but anything above a walking pace is quick on ice in a vehicle weighing a couple of tons, the wheels turned to make the corner and of course the vehicle took no notice and kept straight on and collided with the boards, it then got round the corner shedding bits of range rover, a wing mirror here, a bit of indicator there, you get the picture. The driver finally straightened up the now tatty police car and went very slowly back towards the zamboni doors accompanied by a hysterical Nicky Chinn who was passing bits of police car back through the passenger window until it finally got off the ice.

Now that's the part the general public saw , here's what happened later.
My job was working for SYP in the force control room directing these traffic cars to various incidents, as a result many of these officers were well known to me and they knew I was a keen steelers supporter. I was actually on a night shift that night , 10pm start. At around ten past I received the inevitable phone call from the traffic sergeant , "where you there?" he asked, "of course I was" I answered, "I'll be there in ten minutes" he said.

I'm now sat in a side office being "interviewed" as a witness watching the Sgt's shoulders slump lower and lower as I recounted the events of the night, finally the interview was completed and the Sgt , with a hopeful look in his eyes, asked me if there were many other people at the event, that hopeful look lessened with my answer of around 5000, it disappeared altogether when I mentioned that reporters will have been in attendance and it was replaced with horror upon learning that TV crews had filmed the event for broadcast. Turns out that the officer had been instructed to take only the "old" range rover and not to go onto the ice, instead he took the new one and did.

The officer passed away several years ago (RIP) , It's quite possible that the Sgt might have just completed the paperwork.

The things we did.....

[Jayboy]

That was proper funny, I remember it well....

[smbmetal]

Think that incident happened just before my time of watching the Steelers, but I was told humorously many times from people that were there as I think it will still relatively fresh in the minds. I have seen cars on the ice and always thought cars and ice don’t mix well lol.

[Grandma]

I think the only person in the entire building who thought the car wasnt going too fast.....was the driver. It was hilarious as we all watched the inevitable.