Amish Escape Major Injury When Car Hits Buggy Using “Alternative” Visibility Solution

The good news here: there were three Amish people onboard the buggy, and all three – one adult and two juveniles – are (more-or-less) okay. The accident really caught my attention for another reason (more on that below).

It happened yesterday (January 12th) in Ashland County, Ohio, home to several Amish communities. Based on the photos this appears to involve people from the largest settlement in question, a Swartzentruber community. From ACP News:

ASHLAND COUNTY — Ohio State Highway Patrol and the Ashland County Sheriff’s Office responded to a minor car versus Amish buggy crash Monday evening at the intersection of County Road 500 and County Road 281.

The crash occurred at approximately 6:43 p.m. and involved a 2014 Chevrolet Malibu and an Amish buggy. The Malibu was traveling on County Road 281 and was attempting to turn right onto County Road 500 when it collided with the buggy who was traveling westbound on County Road 500.

The report tells us that “no serious injuries were reported at the scene”, and that the horse suffered minor injuries but should recover. So that’s all good news.

What’s of most interest here are the photos. We see that this buggy was using an “alternative” form of reflection/illumination that’s been put into practice in some Swartzentruber Amish communities, known for having objections to battery-powered lighting and SMV triangles.

Namely, PVC pipe sections cut and attached to the spokes of the buggy wheel, as you can see in this next photo:

These first came on the radar back in 2017 in this same community, with this report on how some Amish were testing it as an alternative to the SMV triangle and electric lighting, which are considered too worldly in their group (this also happens to be the community of Levi Shetler, an Amish man who had been in a reported 14 car-buggy accidents).

The solution has apparently stuck around there – and has appeared in other related communities as well, such as in Tennessee. But how does it work?

It works by creating an oscillating reflective effective through the motion of the buggy wheel and movement of the PVC pipes. The pipe sections are of a color that reflects the light from a car’s beams well. Here’s an example in an image I captured one evening in Tennessee:

The quickly moving pipes going up-down-up-down create a “blinking” effect. This is relevant in Ohio especially, as it has the largest Swartzentruber Amish population, in addition to other churches who reject the state-mandated blinking light on buggies.

The PVC pipe is an alternative used by some of these plainest Amish, and perhaps it came into play in this most recent accident. These buggies certainly aren’t lit up like some are, but the PVC pipe solution definitely makes those buggies which carry it more visible.

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