A world of indifferences

[Howard Wright]

Hi All

They call mad motorcyclists like that donors round here!

We used to live on the B4358, a horizontally and vertically challenged road.  Our cottage was on a narrow section effectively single track. Every year during the summer the air ambulance attended motorbike accidents, sometimes several times. Sadly on two occasions for fatalities.

99% of bikers are responsible good riders but the remaining percent   .

Cheers

Howard

[John Mason]

When I was doing my driving course for APD and doing the commentary bit I complained to the instructor that I couldn’t comment on everything that I could see around me despite using all the abbreviations. His reply was very cool calm and collected saying, “You must be driving to fast then”

John Mason.

[Malcolm Parker]

I remember it well.  I hope that the motorcyclist learned from his near death experience and is riding rather more responsibly.   The irony is that Steve and myself were picking up the 'warning, vintage cars today' signs that are put up on navigational rallies on narrow roads to warn oncoming traffic.   I witnessed the incident from the passenger seat and was looking behind me as Steve made his manoeuvre.  When you are used to being a passenger in a vintage  car this is second nature.   The bike came over the blind crest on the wrong side of the road and was probably doing over the ton.
Had we been in a larger modern car the outcome would probably have been worse.

[andrew34ruby]

It must be thirty years ago, but I will always remember. I drove over the brow of a slight rise at a speed such that I could stop in the distance I could see to be clear. As I went over the brow I saw a police motorbike coming towards me on my side of the road. He was only doing about 30 mph but that was enough to mean I could not stop in time. He was escorting a huge group of racing cyclists so he could not move over onto his own side. I was driving a big transit with a loaded car trailer. Will never know how, but I managed to slow a lot and run partly off the edge of the road. He just continued at 30 mph without realising there was a problem.

[Reckless Rat]

This is one of the reasons that a lot of drivers/riders come to grief on rural roads. It's not just a question of being able to stop in the distance you can see to be clear. You have to dial in the fact that whoever or whatever comes in the opposite direction ALSO needs room to stop, and allowances have to be made. ALWAYS expect the unexpected. It WILL happen, one day. You were lucky, Andrew.

[andrew34ruby]

This is one of the reasons that a lot of drivers/riders come to grief on rural roads. It's not just a question of being able to stop in the distance you can see to be clear. You have to dial in the fact that whoever or whatever comes in the opposite direction ALSO needs room to stop, and allowances have to be made. ALWAYS expect the unexpected. It WILL happen, one day. You were lucky, Andrew.

I was damned unlucky! Someone coming towards me on my side of the road is not normal! I was unlucky to be there at that moment. Skill prevented the collision.

But I agree that being able to stop in the distance I can see to be clear is often not enough. This was brought home to me twenty odd years ago when driving on a very narrow very rural road. High hedges on both sides and going around a long curve. I could see a length of clear road in front. The car coming towards me could see a length of clear road in front of him. What neither of us had realised was that we were both looking at the same bit of clear road! We both braked, both kept well to our left using the narrow verges, and both stopped with our bonnets side by side, less than half an inch from wheelarch to wheelarch.