North Dakota Code § 39-21-43

Display of warning devices when vehicle disabled
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1. Whenever any truck, bus, truck tractor, trailer, semitrailer, or pole trailer eighty inches 
[20.32 decimeters] or more in overall width or thirty feet [91.44 decimeters] or more in 
overall length is stopped upon a roadway or adjacent shoulder, the driver shall 
immediately actuate vehicular hazard warning signal lamps meeting the requirements 
of this chapter. The lamps need not be displayed by a vehicle parked lawfully in an 
urban district, or stopped lawfully to receive or discharge passengers, or stopped to 
avoid conflict with other traffic or to comply with the directions of a police officer or an 
official traffic-control device, or while the devices specified in subsections 2 through 8 
are in place.
2. Whenever any vehicle of a type referred to in subsection 1 is disabled, or stopped for 
more than ten minutes, upon a roadway outside of an urban district at any time when 
lighted lamps are required, the driver of the vehicle shall display the following warning 
devices except as provided in subsection 3:
a. A lighted fusee, a lighted red electric lantern, or a portable red emergency 
reflector must immediately be placed at the traffic side of the vehicle in the 
direction of the nearest approaching traffic.
b. As soon thereafter as possible but in any event within the burning period of the 
fusee (fifteen minutes), the driver shall place three liquid -burning flares (pot 
torches), or three lighted red electric lanterns, or three portable red emergency 
reflectors on the roadway in the following order:
(1) One, approximately one hundred feet [30.48 meters] from the disabled 
vehicle in the center of the lane occupied by the vehicle and toward traffic 
approaching in that lane.
(2) One, approximately one hundred feet [30.48 meters] in the opposite 
direction from the disabled vehicle and in the center of the traffic lane 
occupied by such vehicle.
(3) One at the traffic side of the disabled vehicle not less than ten feet [30.48 
decimeters] rearward or forward thereof in the direction of the nearest 
approaching traffic. If a lighted red electric lantern or a red portable 
emergency reflector has been placed at the traffic side of the vehicle in 
accordance with paragraph 1, it may be used for this purpose.
3. Whenever any vehicle referred to in this section is disabled, or stopped for more than 
ten minutes, within five hundred feet [152.4 meters] of a curve, hillcrest, or other 
obstruction to view, the warning device in the direction must be so placed as to afford 

ample warning to other users of the highway, but in no case less than one hundred 
feet [30.48 meters] nor more than five hundred feet [152.4 meters] from the disabled 
vehicle.
4. Whenever any vehicle of a type referred to in this section is disabled, or stopped for 
more than ten minutes, upon any roadway of a divided highway during the time lighted 
lamps are required, the appropriate warning devices prescribed in subsections 2 and 3 
must be placed as follows: one at a distance of approximately two hundred feet [60.96 
meters] from the vehicle in the center of the lane occupied by the stopped vehicle and 
in the direction of traffic approaching in that lane; one at a distance of approximately 
one hundred feet [30.48 meters] from the vehicle, in the center of the lane occupied by 
the vehicle and in the direction of traffic approaching in that lane; one at the traffic side 
of the vehicle and approximately ten feet [30.48 decimeters] from the vehicle in the 
direction of the nearest approaching traffic.
5. Whenever any motor vehicle used in the transportation of explosives or any cargo tank 
truck used for the transportation of any flammable liquid or compressed gas is 
disabled, or stopped for more than ten minutes, at any time and place mentioned in 
subsection 2, 3, or 4, the driver of the vehicle shall immediately display red electric 
lanterns or portable red emergency reflectors in the same number and manner 
specified in subsection 2, 3, or 4. Flares, fusees, or signals produced by flame may not 
be used as warning devices for vehicles of the type mentioned in this subsection nor 
for vehicles using compressed gas as a fuel.
6. The warning devices described in subsections 2 through 5 need not be displayed 
where there is sufficient light to reveal persons and vehicles within a distance of one 
thousand feet [304.8 meters].
7. Whenever any vehicle described in this section is disabled, or stopped for more than 
ten minutes, upon a roadway outside of an urban district or upon the roadway of a 
divided highway at any time when lighted lamps are not required by section 39 -21-01 
the driver of the vehicle shall display two red flags as follows:
a. If traffic on the roadway moves in two directions, one flag shall be placed 
approximately one hundred feet [30.48 meters] to the rear and one flag 
approximately one hundred feet [30.48 meters] in advance of the vehicle in the 
center of the lane occupied by the vehicle.
b. Upon a one -way roadway, one flag must be placed approximately one hundred 
feet [30.48 meters] and one flag approximately two hundred feet [60.96 meters] to 
the rear of the vehicle in the center of the lane occupied by the vehicle.
8. When any vehicle described in this section is stopped entirely off the roadway and on 
an adjacent shoulder at any time and place mentioned in this section, the warning 
devices must be placed, as nearly as practicable, on the shoulder near the edge of the 
roadway.
9. The flares, fusees, red electric lanterns, portable red emergency reflectors, and flags 
to be displayed as required in this section must conform with the applicable 
requirements of section 39-21-42.

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