I knew I had jinxed it... Oh well.
Where is it written that they were being quoted as "Experts" ... they are well known (by some) personalities. Better known than you or I.
Better they quote them than us ... as it would have a better chance of making it into print.
Only the END result matters ... and would general public believe you or I ... ???
They've never heard of you ...
When life throws you a curve ... Lean into it ...
Absolutely. Ride with earplugs and it's the same thing... had this direct experience with a Harley executing an overtake inside my lane. I'd had no idea that the bloke was there and then suddenly BRRRRAAAAAP and he's there on my shoulder at about two feet linear distance between us. I hadn't heard anything until he was level with me. 100 zone.
Waving other riders through is one thing, this shit going on is quite another... I'd pulled onto SH2 in Featherston about two minutes earlier and he hadn't been there then so I hadn't been holding the guy up. Can't be sure about mirror checks but I am in the habit of taking a look every now and again and then monitoring regularly once I see someone behind me.
Anyway... the loud pipes thing... it might work IF THEY PROJECTED THE SOUND FORWARD. Possibly shaping the sound in a manner similar to a headlight's beam. As far as I'm aware, there's nothing on the market currently that does this, I haven't heard of anyone protoyping it or trialling it either.
It's possible you may be overestimating the reading ability of the NZ public. (From memory the average NZ reading age is that of a 12 yo.) Most don't read beyond the headlines, only a small percentage of the Herald's diminishing readership would have bothered to read the article. Kronfeld's name might have caused a few rugby fans to read a couple of paragraphs but...
There is a grey blur, and a green blur. I try to stay on the grey one. - Joey Dunlop
I was the one to use the word 'expert' when I provided some quotes from the NZHerald report.
I, also, have difficulty with the word 'report' as I felt it was tending more to an explanation piece. Considering the writer is a "Consumer Affairs Reporter", I am surprised he didn't actually ask some of those who are more likely to know about road safety, than Kronfeld or Cameron, such as RideForEver or Motorcycle Safety Advisory Council [MSAC] or, perhaps, some of the motorcycle riding instructors. And then he might have been able to write a report which outlined steps that could be taken by motorcyclists to "up their game" and lessen the chance of them having a serious crash.
I was a little surprised that the writer included Kronfeld's reaction to the CAS findings - Kronfeld wasn't sure what to make of the CAS figures... - on who is considered the 'at fault' party in motorcycle crashes - The NZTA data, provided by the crash analysis system (CAS), found the rider was likely to have primary responsibility in 73 per cent of the deadly motorcycle crashes between 2015 and 2019. Perhaps the writer was hoping it would highlight something, what I am not sure of except that Kronfeld moves further from being an 'expert' in my opinion.
As for the 'expert' comment from Cameron about loud pipes, the less said the better.
Considering that both men, Kronfeld and Cameron, offered what are considered by many as hackneyed explanations to explain how motorcyclists can reduced crashes - 'it's the other road users' fault' and 'loud pipes' - as their main advice suggested to me that neither were anywhere near being an expert or even well informed.
So, in hindsight, perhaps I should have put quotes [" "] round the word 'expert' in the introduction to what I wrote and so suggest to readers that I am being slightly sarcastic about the use of that word. The fact I didn't 'quote mark' the word is because I thought that readers of what I wrote would see that I was being slightly sarcastic - my mistake.
Mea culpa...
Every year I do this, every time I regret it but here goes.
Not quite sure where they get the figure of 57. The official crash database has 53 crashes where someone on a motorbike died made up of 53 riders and one pillion. All the riders were male. They probably counted the two crashes where motorbikes were involved but it was another party who died.
22 crashes at intersections and driveways. Eleven were multi vehicle where the rider was at fault, five the other vehicles fault, three where fault was unclear due to the lack of information. When the other vehicle was at fault they were your standard SMIDNSY so you could argue the rider could have done something but without knowing everything about the crash that is a hard one. Where the rider was at fault you have inattention before slamming into a stationary vehicle clearly signalling a right turn and several examples where the rider was doing at least 80 in a 50 and a car or truck turned across their path. I cannot bring myself to blame the car driver when people do that. The only red light running crash and the only fail to stop at a stop sign crash actually had the rider being the guilty party, not the other vehicle as we come to expect. Three intersection crashes only involved the rider.
So 31 crashes not at intersections. In 21 of them there were no other vehicles involved, one involved a wild pig at night, the others you have to say the rider was the primary reason for the crash occurring. A couple of potential medical events but more often than not people throwing their lives away.
The kicker for me is that of the ten multi vehicle crashes not at intersections eight were clearly the fault of the rider, generally crossing the centre line on a left hand curve and having a head on or trying to ride in a group and failing miserably.
Getting picky the data includes three farm bikes doing what farm bikes do and three dirt bikes doing the same. Generally with the rider not bothering with their helmet. I don’t think they should be used to raise my ACC again but that is an argument going nowhere.
Three learners actively learning. Several suspended/disqualified riders on big Harleys. Oh yes. 17 of the 53 bikes involved were Harleys. Next was Suzuki on seven then you get five Hondas and five Kawasaki’s.
Biggest five year age bracket was 45 to 49 with nine riders then six each for 20 to 24 and 55 to 59. Only five crashes on a wet road, eight at night. 21 crashes at the weekend.
My opinion – rider fault 41, possible rider fault 2, probably rider fault 2, not rider fault 7, unclear 1.
There are a thousand ways to present this information but it is generally pointless posting it because we are all entrenched in our own views and it will just start more arguments. I ride because I like the adrenaline I get from it but I think I know when and where to ride sensibly so that I get home at night alive and with my licence intact. When I look at crashes like this I use a measure of whether it could have been me. There are a couple where it was wrong place wrong time and there is nothing anyone of us could have done, that’s the risk we all take and why motorbikes are incompatible with Vision Zero. There are also a couple where the rider made a decision which turned out to be the wrong one and then found he was in a position where there was no escape route. Have done the same, could have been me.
Other than that once again it is a whole lot of people who did not pay the full attention required when you ride a motorbike. A couple of stolen bikes so sod them, but most of the rest could have been avoided if they didn’t do stupid speeds in inappropriate places, didn’t ride while wasted, didn’t ride immediately after having a drunken bust up with the Mrs and generally just concentrating on what was happening in front of them. Oh yes, and not hitting trees. Trees hurt.
My personal experience of journalists is that there are no others amongst us who are quite so talented at distorting the truth without actually telling a lie.
On the other hand, I like applied statistics (lies, damned lies and statistics) so maybe I'm irreparably twisted as well. However, it is the most powerful investigative tool I have ever been given when properly used and so i get frustrated by the way LTNZ collect accident data, because it is not formal enough to lend itself to proper analysis.
Even so, it is possible to make some rough approximations which within their "rough" boundaries can be a bit useful.
The first one is that ABOUT 40% of fatal motorcycle accidents are single vehicle events. Even allowing for shitty road surfaces etc, I find it hard to not conclude therefore that the largest risk that motorcyclists face in NZ is motorcyclists. We kill ourselves at a faster rate than any outside factor.
The next one is also pretty vague but it looks like the 50/50 live or die speed for a motorcycle accident is about 68 kph - not very fast imho.
Let's extend that a bit.
Kinetic energy, the energy of motion, the energy that's dispersed in a prang by tearing things and people apart is proportional to the SQUARE of the speed at impact moment. This means that the probability of death rises and accelerates very quickly above the 50/50 mark. Sadly i cannot with any certainty state what the probability of dying is at any other speed but suspect it is like:-
68 kph 50/50 death
75 kph >85% death
80 kph >95% death
90 kph and up death
No proof, just opinion but that's what the numbers look like to me. Of course, these are probabilities and there is never a 100% probability for something that has not happened yet. There are those who have lost it at over 100kph on the public road and walked away from it, but not many of them.
Also, some will use this information to say that if I'm dead at 90 kph, I might as well be doing 150 kph cos i can't get any deader than dead. The biggest risk is motorcyclists remember.
I may not be as good as I once was, but I'm as good once as I always was.
In some ways that doesn't make great reading, but in other ways it does - it shows just how much we are in control of our own destinies in terms of making it home safely after each ride.
I'd be much more concerned if those at fault figures were reversed, as there would be much less that I could do for my safety on a personal level.
Sent from my SM-G965F using Tapatalk
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Bookmarks