Police cruiser collides with deer

Police are warning motorists to watch out for deers after a Niagara Regional Police cruiser collided with one Monday.

“Unfortunately, this is the time of the year when deer are very active especially at sunrise and sunset. We would encourage people to slow down and scan far ahead when driving,” said NRP spokeswoman Stephanie Sabourin in an email.

She said the patrol car was travelling on the QEW in Fort Erie at about 8:30 a.m. when the vehicle struck the deer. The police officer was uninjured, but the deer was killed in the collision.

The cruiser sustained significant frontend damage, but Sabourin said the officer was able to safely slow down the vehicle that was travelling about 100 km/h at the time.

Sgt. Kerry Schmidt, from the OPP Highway Safety Division, said he wasn’t aware of the collision. Although most of the highways patrolled by OPP officers are fenced off, he said collisions involving deer do happen.

“We do get the odd crash,” he said. “We had an elk that was smoked on the 400 a little while ago, and deer strikes for sure. This is the season when we see them.”

Neither the NRP nor OPP were able to provide the estimates of the number of collisions involving deer so far this fall. Sabourin advised motorists that because headlights can cause deer to freeze, they can sometimes prompt the animals to run clear of roadways by blaring their car horn.