Woman who stopped to save ducklings on highway gets $100 ticket
A woman who stopped on a New Hampshire highway to help a group of ducklings whose mother had been struck and killed by a car should've been commended by police for her compassion. Instead, she was given a ticket.
Hallie Bibeau, a 33-year-old from Newfields, N.H., was driving east on Route 101 in Brentwood on Friday when she saw the ducklings.
"I could hear them peeping, and I looked over ... the right-hand side of the road, and I saw that their mom had been hit and was dead on the side," Bibeau told WMUR-TV. "I couldn't just continue on."
Bibeau called 911 and waited for police to arrive.
"While I was sitting there, I saw a few of them try to go to the westbound lane and got run over," Bibeau said. "It was terrible to see."
She got out of her car to scoop up two of the injured ducklings.
When a state trooper showed up, he gave Bibeau a $100 ticket for stopping in the median, a restricted area.
"We keep our medians free for vehicles who are truly having an emergency," state Police Lt. Nicole Armaganian told the ABC affiliate. "Stopping for an injured duck or ducklings is not what we would consider to be an emergency."
Bibeau, a new mom herself, says she plans to contest the ticket.
"For the mom that had gotten hit, I just wanted to do whatever I could for her ducklings," she said. "And if I could save two of them, I could save two of them."
Sadly, one of the ducklings later died, wildlife officials said.
