South Australian Ambulance Transport Inc v Wahlheim [1948] HCA 32

High Court of Australia Latham C.J. Rich, Dixon and McTiernan JJ. South Australian Ambulance Transport Inc v Wahlheim [1948] HCA 32

ORDER Appeal allowed with costs. Order of Supreme Court discharged and in lieu thereof judgment of Local Court restored. Plaintiff to pay costs of defendant in Supreme Court.

cur. adv. vult.

The following written judgments were delivered:—

Nov. 29 Latham C.J.

On a Sunday morning (7th July 1946) the respondent was driving a Dodge motor car, 1933 model, on the outskirts of Adelaide south along Burnside Road towards the intersection of that road with Godfrey Terrace, which crosses it at a right angle. An ambulance driven by one R. G. Markham, an employee of The South Australian Ambulance Transport Incorporated (the appellant company) was taking an urgent case to hospital. The ambulance was driving west along Godfrey Terrace East towards the intersection. Thus the ambulance was on the left of the motor car and the motor car was on the right of the ambulance. The car and the ambulance came into violent collision at the intersection. The plaintiff was injured and his car was severely damaged. He sued the appellant company in the Local Court. The learned magistrate found that the ambulance was driving too fast, so that the driver could not stop in time to avoid the plaintiff's car, and that the driver was accordingly guilty of negligence; that the plaintiff was also guilty of negligence in not looking to his left sooner than he did; that if he had looked sooner he would have been able to avoid a collision by accelerating at an earlier time than that at which he did in fact accelerate; that therefore, though the defendant's driver was negligent, it was the plaintiff's negligence which brought about the accident, and accordingly the plaintiff could not recover.