Sunday Times Misprint?????

[ByfordBlade]

A mate at work got into me first thing this morning telling me I have been wrong with my claims that most bike/car crashes are the fault of drivers and not riders as is common perception. He said there was an article in yesterdays ST which said most fatalities were the riders fault. I found it on PerthNow:

Riders say safety boss has no plan to stem toll | PerthNow

Interesting article but the quote that 23 out of 29 fatalities were found to be the riders fault does not look good when the point of the article was for the MRA to discredit Dorrington as he puts all the blame on us. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the bulk of deaths this year in bike crashes were found to be a driver at fault

[potato]

A mate at work got into me first thing this morning telling me I have been wrong with my claims that most bike/car crashes are the fault of drivers and not riders as is common perception. He said there was an article in yesterdays ST which said most fatalities were the riders fault. I found it on PerthNow:

Riders say safety boss has no plan to stem toll | PerthNow

Interesting article but the quote that 23 out of 29 fatalities were found to be the riders fault does not look good when the point of the article was for the MRA to discredit Dorrington as he puts all the blame on us. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the bulk of deaths this year in bike crashes were found to be a driver at fault

ol dorro is good at handball, he recons we all speed so, yea its our fault.
as a rider you have to watch constantly for cars doing unexpected things, cause, sadly, they do.
so do people on bikes.
just take care out there and keep vigilant and fuck the bullshit.

[Suzukiphile]

ive emailed the editor of perthnow asking him to verify or correct this information as i believe it is incorrect but i have not had the courtesy of a response as of yet.

[Aphex]

Good luck.... i think you'll find they're as anti-bike as dorrington.

[fosh]

Yeah i saw this too and was a bit thrown off.
I reckon its probably an accurate quote but the legal blame game is probably a bit different to the common sense one - ie bike speeding a bit, car didn't realise that they couldn't pull out because of higher bike speed, *bike responsible*

[Hewie]

You'll probably find the distinction is between deaths and accidents.

Most accidents are cause by cars .... but deaths is bikes at fault

[sathid]

What Hewie said.

Accidents at higher speeds on bends or on country roads are more likely to be fatal, and it is these areas where the accidents tend to be single vehicle.

Even the old Hunt Report indicated this.

Perhaps it is time for us to collate known (and dated) statistics and information (properly referenced).

Perhaps in a blog, rather than a thread?

[Spock]

Police found that in all but six of this year's 29 motorcycle fatalities, the rider was at fault.

I'm not sure I believe these statistics. I'd like to know the source of these statistics and the details of the accidents.

But even if true, 6 killed through no fault of their own is still too many.

I do however fear that in WA in the last few years the 'normal' bike fatal accident statistics have been skewed by a huge rise in cashed-up young male miners buying hypersport bikes and tearing around the country roads at fearsome speeds - without necessarily having the experience and skill to do so 'safely'.

This situation is not good for us in that it is increasingly hard to argue favourably on the side of motorcyclists against people like Grant Dorrington.

[Jonchilds]

If the RSC is only concerned with deaths, then their targetting of bikes seems justified from those statistics.
However, there are another 400 or so accidents which involve serious injury to the rider or pillion, and they are strongly skewed towards cars at fault.

But hey, as long as people don't die.

[Spock]

there are another 400 or so accidents which involve serious injury to the rider or pillion, and they are strongly skewed towards cars at fault.

If this is true it forms the basis for a good argument in our favour. Where'd you get these stats?

[Scoundrel]

I have just found this on the ORS' website. They have revised their motorcycle 'fact sheet' it seems:

http://www.officeofroadsafety.wa.gov...cember2007.pdf

About two thirds of motorcycle crashes involved another vehicle and about 20 per cent were singlevehicle crashes. Single vehicle crashes tended to be more serious. About 40 per cent of single vehicle motorcycle crashes resulted in serious injuries, compared with 23.5 per cent of multiple vehicle crashes.

In 2005, 86 per cent of motorcyclists involved in serious crashes were male. Riders over the age of 30 account for more than 50 per cent of fatal and serious motorcycle injuries, with riders aged 21-29 accounting for a further 31 per cent.

Most crashes were at relatively low speeds, with the majority being between 30 and 50km/h at impact. In the majority of cases, the other vehicles involved in crashes were passenger vehicles and in two thirds of crashes the cars violated the right of way of the motorcycles.

Oh snap!

[Crazy-Jakey]

How about the car accident deaths where one of the car drivers were at fault

[cruelcheffy]

Bullshit!
I've read the paper on Sunday it was the other way round.

[Tenchi]

*reads the comments on the article*

Exactly how many of you guys replied to this...

[Rebecca]

According to the police this year (07) has been very heavily deaths due to rider error. I can think of 5 off the top of my head that were driver error, and about 5 that were rider error. Hopefully we'll all do better next year (drivers and riders)!!

There is something to consider to, How do they work out who is at fault? IF the rider was speeding and a car pulled out, who do they find at fault (its a serious question, the ICWA find the person whose actions caused the accident at fault - ie car drivr, but maybe the police and ORS see it differently?)

This year killed by drivers
Guy on KTM run over from behind
Dice recently
Peter at Quinns Rocks
The two on the bike that got hit from behind on Tonkin (did they both die?)

Thats 5 for sure

Killed by "rider error"

2 seperate incident where they went into the fron of an oncoming car while overtaking
guy who died near airport with no helmet on (Assumption?)
Rider at Port Hedland - alcohol
Rider in the hills? >Roleystone ?speed/corner not taken

I cant think of any more specifics. ANyone?

I have been reading heavily on the statistics of motorcycle accidents for a few years and one thing it I think it is very important for us to acknowledge is the following:-

In double vehicle accidents you are more likely to get injured and the car is more likely to be at fault

In single vehicle accidents you are more likely to die and be at fault.


You choose you action, you live or die with the results. Yes the drivers are at fault, but so are we sometimes.

And you choose, do you want an injury or death? Toss the coin. Injury could be worse then death, but normally is better.