MatLax

I started riding a bike again two months ago and yesterday it was the first time I had an accident, here's what happened:

I'm riding back from work on a not so busy street (it's nearly 1 am) on the right are streets going down a small hill. A driver coming from one of these streets wanting to turn left on the street I was on didn't do a complete stop (I had the priority), when I saw him coming uphill I started braking just in case and I saw that he wasn't going to stop so I tried to stop but it was too late (when I realized this the first thing that came to my mind was "Well... **** this" and I braced for impact).

I hit the side of his car, hit my head on his hood (thank me I was wearing a helmet) and destroyed his side mirror with my shoulder or something. I landed on the pavement got up, the driver got out of his car and asked me if I was okay, I wanted to take my bike and throw it in his windshield but stayed calm and just told him "You didn't look to your left", he replied that he did (but I know he didn't because I had the time to see it). I told him I was okay, checked my bike, took note of his license plate number and went home.

Today my shoulder is hurting me as is my rib cage, but it's not unbearable, if the pain doesn't stop before the end of the week I'll have to see my physio and I'll call the police so that I can make a claim...

So, what's your story?

Roody

My worst accident was a one-bike fall. I was riding about 20 mph on a street that had been repaved that day (smOOOth!) when I suddenly found myself on the pavement, face down. I walked about 1/2 mile home, but passed out later that night and went to the hospital via ambulance. Besides about 200 square inches of road rash and a hematoma the size of a grapefruit, I had several broken ribs and a fractured scaphoid bone in my wrist. The wrist fracture failed to heal, and I had surgery to reunite the bone. I was off work for more than 5 months.

Almost 5 years later, the screw in the wrist bone came loose and caused an extremely painful nerve disorder. That necessitated another surgery, 5 days in the hospital and 5 more months off work. To this day, I still have wrist pain when I ride, so I can only do about half the miles I used to do.

I never determined for sure what caused the fall. When I was crawling around on the pavement afterward, I picked up a large bolt that was lying there. I believe there was debris left in the street by the repaving crew, but like I said I can't know for sure.

Digital_Cowboy

My advice is that threads like this shouldn't be started until AFTER any and all lawsuits have been settled. Because as has been pointed out in the past lawyers and insurance companies have people who search The Net for any and all mention of details of the "accidents" in an effort to minimize their clients guilt and/or pay out.

B. Carfree

One year my wife and her younger sister decided to do the Davis Double Century on a Schwinn 5-speed tandem. For kicks and giggles I decided to join them on a Huffy 1-speed tandem. (It's a very flat route; I have ridden it in 8 hours.) Not surprisingly, the person who had agreed to ride with me backed out the night before the ride. Undeterred, I set off with a sign on the back seat reading, "Sag Wagon". About 20 miles into the ride we came upon a group of riders who had wrecked. One of the riders whose bike was disabled was game enough to leave his bike with others for a real sag wagon and jumped on with me. It was all good until we were heading down the first hill. I belatedly realized that the front brake was not going to be up to the job and told Cameron we should gently use the rear hub "coaster" brake. Unfortunately, we applied it a bit too hard. Just as my stoker was passing me I finally regained control of the beast. Unfortunately, Cameron had had enough and decided to cut his loses in mid-recovery: down we went. Cameron was unscathed but I had a rock trapped between the road and the top of my ankle during our slide. Just as we got the bike off the road a woman drove by with some ice; I reversed my sock to put the hole in the back and shoved some ice on the wound and off we went. The cauterizing heat of the rock grinding on the pavement meant the wound did not bleed much even though it was quite deep. Twenty-five years later I still have the 3 cm. radius scar.

Unfortunately, sometime between our crash and lunch the rear hub gave up. We pedaled a good 40 miles on what felt like a full brake. Lucky for me, a friend had gotten sick and gave me his bike to finish up on.

I saw Cameron a few more times while he was a student at U.C. Davis. He crashed his bike two more times that year and gave up cycling for good. I've always felt a bit guilty for that.

MatLax

Oh it doesn't work this way here! You can't fill a lawsuit against someone in the case of an accident on the road, there's a governmental insurance program for everyone who's on the road... I just took the license plate because if I need it the person can be reached and confirm that the accident happened, but the guy wouldn't have to pay a dime, it's the government that would pay for me.

Roody

That's cool. But you still have to pay for the insurance, don't you?

In the US, many individual states have what's called no-fault insurance, which means you don't have to sue anybody in an auto accident. But this is run by private insurance companies, not the government.

Chris516

I have been in several bike accidents.

1981-I was riding my 10-speed. As I turned a corner, a woman in her 60's or 70's turned at the same corner I did. She turned to sharply, and I turned wide, resulting in my ending up halfway under her car and my metal pedal digging into my foot.

1997-I was riding my 24-speed racing bike. As I went through the intersection I was broad-sided by a motorist.

2010-I was riding my 24-speed racing bike. As I was riding down a major street, I suddenly hit a spot where a layer of asphalt had worn away. When my front tire ran into the spot, I flew off my bike and broke my wrist.

MatLax

Income taxes, driver's license and license plate all pay for the insurance society. The government covers everyone on the road for the damage done to them, not to their cars, private insurance companies cover the cars and the infrastructures that may get damaged in an accident.

colombo357

I see.

CCrew

There's mistake #1. Police should have been called and a report made at the time of the accident.

sudo bike

I was about to post the same thing, but it may not exactly apply quite the same Up North...

sauerwald

I have had one accident that resulted in injury - it happened exactly two weeks ago. I was walking my bike on the platform at a train station, I heard someone behind me call my name, and I turned, got my feet tangled up in each other and the bike pedals, and fell. I broke a bone in my left hand which required surgery, and I will now be off the bike for ~6 weeks. In the hospital Emergency room, the first question that I was asked was if I was wearing a helmet - to which I answered NO, so I am undoubtedly adding to the statistical support for helmet use. If only I had been wearing boxing gloves, this wouldn't have happened!

mikeybikes

^ Huh? That doesn't make sense. You broke your a bone in your hand. How would a helmet even have helped in that matter?

Fasteryoufool

In Quebec, I'm sure that's true.

Here in the 'States, insurance companies are not (so far) publicly funded. What No-Fault Insurance means is; if the accident isn't your fault, you don't pay. Your rates don't go up, you don't pay the deductible, etc. The other insurance company pays. if it IS your fault, it's different.

Fasteryoufool

Growing up in Oregon, I rode in the rain - pretty much all the time. Once I was in Downtown Eugene, and an old(er) couple drove past me, then turned into a driveway right in front of me. It was the 80's, so sidepull brakes, steel wheels and wet out... so I applied the brakes as hard as I could and plowed into the side of their car doing about 15mph. tacoed my front wheel and bent my forks. They never even stopped.

sudo bike

It's not uncommon for hospital policy to have standardized questions for certain accidents. In accidents involving a bike in any way, it's conceivable it's just their procedure to ask if you were wearing a helmet. And no, it doesn't make sense. But I could see it happening.

God, I've been working corporate too long...

MatLax

I would be interested to hear from the bike messengers, but they're very busy in the fixed gear board so they don't have time to come up here, and any way they don't advocate safety (just teasing!), I'm sure they would have many stories to tell!

Digital_Cowboy

You did explain to them that you had been walking your bike and not riding it, right?

ScottNotBombs

My accident didn't involve a car... I was sprinting and my chain broke and got caught in my rear derailluer cage. It locked up my rear wheel and went over the bars. I broke my collar bone and wasn't wearing a helmet (dumb, I know) and got a big gash in my head. I don't have health insurance, but I have a friend who's a paramedic and he took care of my head. He said it was basically down to the skull and dug the gravel out, sprayed it with a syringe full of isopropyl alcohol and stitched it. I couldn't even feel him doing the sutures after the rubbing alcohol, it was so painful.

ro-monster

Mine happened on a drizzly January morning, the first day back to work after the holidays, riding through downtown San Francisco on my way to the train, going down a bit of a hill, approaching an intersection. Suddenly a taxi pulled away from the curb on the cross street. I thought he would keep going right into my path, and braked hard. I managed to torque the front wheel to one side and was thrown to the pavement so quickly I didn't even have time to realize I was falling. The first thing I saw when I looked up was the taxi driving away. Another driver stopped and helped me and my bike to the curb, where I sat for a while, and then walked home. I considered riding but thought better of it, as I couldn't move my right arm. It took my boyfriend two hours to convince me I should go to the ER. Turned out that the top of my humerus, where it sits inside the shoulder joint, was broken into 4 pieces. Result: 2 surgeries, 2.5 months off work, 7 months of rehab, 9 months off the bike.

Oddly enough, the ER did not ask if I was wearing a helmet. (I was, a full-face helmet even; it never touched the pavement.)