Well, perhaps Rastus can confirm ACC claims, but figured I would jump in with some numbers as well. Seems like an annual thing.
45 fatal crashes in 2017 involving motorbikes. Down from 55 the year before and 53 the year before that. Through the 80’s it was triple digits every year, peaking at 148 in 1987. Fell throughout the 90’s to 42 in 1999 then dropped in to the 30’s every year from 2000 until 2007 when it hit 40. Went to 50 in 2008 and has been bouncing around since then with only one year in the 30’s. Many reasons for those changes and no real need to go off the deep end due to one bad weekend.
So 45 fatal crashes last year, 50 bikes. Five crashes involved two bikes. In four of those crashes all eight bikes were Harleys which I found interesting and probably suggests something. So in order of appearance -
16 Harley
7 Suzuki
7 Yamaha
5 Honda
4 Triumphs
2 each BMW, Ducati and Kawasaki
1 each Can Am, Moto Guzzi, MV Augusta, SYM and TGB (mopeds)
As always, without actual data as to how many of each type of bike is on the road these figures are rather meaningless, but good to point fingers. Even with the number registered we don’t know how many km each one does, in what conditions etc etc etc. So you've got to be careful when someone says X is worse than Y because Y could be worse than X, it depends what is being pushed and by whom. Hello ACC. Note, no fault is implied in any of this, it is just the bikes involved.
I’m going to assume we can call all the Harleys cruisers here, so based on the model recorded I would say this –
21 cruisers
20 sport
4 off road style
2 proper off road
2 moped
1 Can am
The sports class is actually a bit vague, I have lumped your VTR250, XJ600 and a K1200 in there as well. It is everything that is not lean back cruiser or stand on pegs on gravel stylee.
So yeah, a few interesting things jump out. Nine out of ten crashes were on a dry road. You’d normally expect more wet road crashes than that so it does suggest a bit of fair weather riding. One quarter of the crashes were on a Sunday which is high as well. Alcohol and/or drugs were a factor in nearly half of all of these crashes. And we argue about hi-viz.
I could go on but Coro is about to start.
No KTMs then, must be the high viz orange
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