Word.ws English Dictionary

blues and twos

blues and twos noun: the flashing lights and loud siren of an emergency vehicle.

Noun

blues and twos pl (plural only)

  1. (Ireland, UK, informal, plural, plural-only) The flashing lights and loud siren of an emergency vehicle.
    • Five minutes later, Bella, efficient as ever, radioed him back with an address near Hove station, about ten minutes drive away, going soberly, or ninety seconds with the blues and twos on.2006, Peter James, Looking Good Dead, New York: Pan, →ISBN, page 142
    • The new directive says risks associated with the use of so-called ‘blues and twos’ by coastguard vehicles “need to be mitigated”.2019 February 20, MacDara Conroy, “No More Blue Lights & Sirens For Irish Coast Guard Road Vehicles Under New Directive”, in Afloat.ie

Adverb

blues and twos (not comparable)

  1. (Ireland, UK, informal) [of an emergency vehicle] with the blues and twos switched on
    • He glanced at his watch. “Blues and twos,” he said. “I want to get there before the train.” [...] They pulled out of the forecourt at the rear of the police office and drove straight across into Vauxhall Bridge Road, ignoring the one-way circuit, their siren and blue light carving a priority...1990, Graham Ison, A Damned Serious Business, Ulverscroft Large Print, →ISBN, pages 351-352
    • If Mondo was alive, he'd be long gone, the ambulance hurtling blues and twos to the nearest hospital.2003, Val McDermid, The Distant Echo, HarperCollins, →ISBN, page 304

Forms of blues and twos

alternative formblues-and-twos

Origin of blues and twos

Originally 1960s police slang, from the blue colour of the lights and the two-tone sound of the siren. Popularised by Blues and Twos, a documentary series broadcast on ITV from 1993.

Questions about blues and twos

What does blues and twos mean?
Blues and twos means the flashing lights and loud siren of an emergency vehicle.
What part of speech is blues and twos?
Blues and twos can be a noun or an adverb.

Words near blues and twos in the dictionary

  1. Bluerina
  2. bluerinse
  3. bluerinses
  4. bluers
  5. blues
  6. blues and twos
  7. blues scale
  8. blues scales
  9. blues-rock
  10. blueschist
  11. blueschists

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: blues and twos (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “blues and twos.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/blues_and_twos. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.