If you have stopped your vehicle on an expressway due to a breakdown, must you switch on your emergency lights, and if the vehicle is not so equipped, your position lights?

In the photo, you are driving in fog on an expressway between noise barriers; a navy blue van is driving in front of you. If your vehicle broke down on such a road, you would have to switch on the hazard warning lights, and if the car does not have them - the sidelights (position lights); this is an obligation in every case, because traffic on an expressway is fast, and in fog a stationary vehicle can be seen from far away only thanks to its lights. The answer is: yes.

The Road Traffic Act requires you to signal a vehicle that is stationary because of a breakdown or an accident on a motorway or an expressway in every case - by switching on the hazard warning lights, or, if the vehicle is not equipped with them, the sidelights, and by placing a reflective warning triangle 100 m behind the vehicle. The signalling is required for the whole time the vehicle is stationary. If possible, you move onto the emergency lane (hard shoulder), and the passengers get out behind the barriers, because staying in a car on an expressway is dangerous.

Legal basis: Art. 50 para. 1 point 1, para. 2 point 1 and para. 3 of the Road Traffic Act (Prawo o ruchu drogowym)