By CASEY NEILL
POLICE will spend an extra 120 hours on Greater Dandenong roads this festive season.
Operation Invincible kicked off last weekend and is aimed at catching drink drivers.
Targeted TAC funding will cover extra shifts to put more officers and patrol cars on the roads during high-trauma times.
Greater Dandenong Highway Patrol’s Senior Sergeant Scott Roberts said his crew stopped 1063 motorists for preliminary breath tests over the weekend, most near hotels.
“Five drivers were found to be over the legal limit, with the highest reading 0.117,” he said.
“The party’s over for these five drivers.
“A variety of other offences were detected including four drivers without a valid licence.”
Operation Invincible will run throughout the Christmas period and into the New Year.
“We’ll be covering more time periods than we would have otherwise been able to do,” Sen Sgt Roberts said.
And it’s not only drink-drivers on their radar.
“It’s a warning to consider everybody else on the road rather than thinking about your own needs, like answering phones, running red lights, speeding… ” he said.
“We will be enforcing all speed offences, not just those that people would consider overly excessive.
“We know for a fact that they contribute to trauma.”
And Sen Sgt Roberts said the efforts to combat trauma wouldn’t end with this operation.
“Touch wood, we’ve had a pretty good year up until now,” he said.
“We hope that continues into the New Year.
“We’ll continue to throw everything we’ve got at these issues.”
