Eh, closet, do you wear a helmet when you commute? Ever been hit by a car from behind?

Actually, I am not sure what the fuss is over. As far as I know, the odds for all of us regarding death are, let's see, uh 100%. None of us get out alive.

Eh, closet, do you wear a helmet when you commute? Ever been hit by a car from behind?


I've posted a number of times that I do. I've even posted a picture of me wearing one. I live in an all ages mandatory helmet law province. I wore one for 7 years before it was a law.

I've never said they are bad, or don't do some good. I've posted that I wish helmets could be made to a higher standard. Search through my posts.

I have been hit 3 times by cars, each time perpendicular to my travel. Gone down a bunch of times too.

Still believe that the need is as slight as the need of a pedestrian, and don't believe helmets protect the brain from a diffuse injury, and I suppose this does relate somewhat to this thread in that, cycling is shown to be a low risk activity. Better odds than driving, walking, having poorer health or even a force of nature.

Eh, closet, do you wear a helmet when you commute? Ever been hit by a car from behind?

Only 1% of fatalities come from someone being hit from behind. Just here to inject some facts rather than ridiculous personal arguments.

Only 1% of fatalities come from someone being hit from behind. Just here to inject some facts rather than ridiculous personal arguments.

Yeah, but he has posted that he has, so I'm guessing he thinks it must happen to everybody too (or could).

Glad to hear you wear your helmet, closetbiker. And getting hit by a car (from whatever quadrant) can, and does, happen. All the more reason TO wear a helmet, I think. In case you're kicked to the curb by an innatentive cager.

Is commercial airline travel safer, or more hazardous, than cycling?

In 15 years of wearing it, it doesn't have a scratch (even with those collisions, and a head on collision with a wrong way cyclists riding in the dark with no light) and the 15 years I rode without a helmet, I never had a scracth either).

I agree it does and can happen, it's just that I've yet to be convinced it's more likely to happen while I ride than when I'm doing something else. I'm also less than convinced that the helmet will save my life if (or when) I really need it. In my MHL province, there are just as many deaths of cyclists that wear helmets than don't. (last 3 years, 12 deaths, 6 with and 6 without helmets)

According to that FARS study, commercial airline travel is almost twice a safe as cycling, but general flying is much more dangerous. Makes sense to me. Commercial airlines have stricter standards for safety.

The guy who hit Ken Kifer was on drugs and alcohol at the time. The driver was a menace to vehicles of all kinds.

Personally, I think of Kifer as 'Killed By a Drunk Driver' moreso than 'Killed While Cycling'.

I finally had a reply from the Globe and mail 15 days afer asking for more info on the bit.

Here's the original article. / Mike Kesterton

Outlook

When Mother Nature Attacks

Richard Morin

16 January 2005
The Washington Post
FINAL
B05
English
Copyright 2005, The Washington Post Co. All Rights Reserved

Tsunamis in South Asia, mudslides in Southern California and
blizzards in the upper Midwest -- suddenly, even a glance at
the headlines or the evening news might be enough to convince
us that Mother Nature has gone on a rampage.

Yes, it's a forbidding world out there. But we can take some
comfort if we remember that natural disasters are rare and
the chance that any one of us will perish in a tidal wave,
hurricane, earthquake or other natural calamity is very, very low
-- even though studies conducted over the past 25 years
consistently have found that most people believe the odds are
very, very high.

In fact, statistically speaking, a person is more likely to
die by falling from a tall building, slipping in the bathtub
or being legally executed than to perish in an earthquake,
flood or "cataclysmic storm" such as a hurricane, according to
the latest estimates by the National Safety Council derived
from 2001 data from the National Center for Health Statistics
and the U.S. Census Bureau.

The overall chance that an individual born in 2001 will die
from any "force of nature" is estimated to be 1 in 3,357.
That's considerably lower than the probability of dying from
various types of accidents, and much smaller than the odds that
an individual will commit suicide or die from complications
from surgical or medical care.

Here are the lifetime odds of succumbing to various natural
calamities:

Exposure to excessive natural cold ... 1 in 6,165

Exposure to excessive natural heat ... 1 in 12,310

Cataclysmic storm ... 1 in 68,388

Lightning ... 1 in 83,930

Flood ... 1 in 105, 512

Earthquake ... 1 in 131,890

Exposure to all other unspecified forces

of nature ... 1 in 92,323

And here are the lifetime odds of expiring from some specific
causes of death, based on official tallies:

Suicide ... 1 in 121

Car accident ... 1 in 247

Pedestrian accident ... 1 in 608

Complications from medical or surgical care ... 1 in 1,222

Riding a bike ... 1 in 4,663

Falling from a ladder or scaffold ... 1 in 8,412

Legal execution ... 1 in 58,618

Being buried alive in a cave-in or landslide ... 1 in 65,945

Dog bite ... 1 in 147,717

Fireworks accident ... 1 in 615,488

Is commercial airline travel safer, or more hazardous, than cycling?

Depends on your standard. Fewer collisions on a per-trip basis on the airlines... more fatalities per collision. But I wear my flying helmet, too! ;)

Here are the lifetime odds of succumbing to various natural
calamities:

Exposure to excessive natural cold ... 1 in 6,165

Exposure to excessive natural heat ... 1 in 12,310

Cataclysmic storm ... 1 in 68,388

Lightning ... 1 in 83,930

Flood ... 1 in 105, 512

Earthquake ... 1 in 131,890

Exposure to all other unspecified forces

of nature ... 1 in 92,323

And here are the lifetime odds of expiring from some specific
causes of death, based on official tallies:

Suicide ... 1 in 121

Car accident ... 1 in 247

Pedestrian accident ... 1 in 608

Complications from medical or surgical care ... 1 in 1,222

Riding a bike ... 1 in 4,663

Falling from a ladder or scaffold ... 1 in 8,412

Legal execution ... 1 in 58,618

Being buried alive in a cave-in or landslide ... 1 in 65,945

Dog bite ... 1 in 147,717

Fireworks accident ... 1 in 615,488

Amazing figures.

I finally had a reply from the Globe and mail 15 days afer asking for more info on the bit.

Here's the original article. / Mike Kesterton

Outlook

When Mother Nature Attacks

Richard Morin

16 January 2005
The Washington Post
FINAL
B05
English
Copyright 2005, The Washington Post Co. All Rights Reserved

Tsunamis in South Asia, mudslides in Southern California and
blizzards in the upper Midwest -- suddenly, even a glance at
the headlines or the evening news might be enough to convince
us that Mother Nature has gone on a rampage.


Fireworks accident ... 1 in 615,488

Interesting figures, but they fail to answer the most important question (unless I missed it).

Are the figurres for the general population or for those who participate in the activity?

Only a small percentage of folks bicycle. Are those figures for the entire population or for those who bicycle?

Same for airline crashes - for those who fly, or for those who do and don't fly?

My suspicion is that these figures are for the population as a whole, and are therefore fairly meaningless.

For example, lightning - do they consider where you live, whether or not you climb peaks in the middle of electrical storms, etc., etc.

How are the tornado figures for those that live in "Tornado Alley" as opposed to those who live in California?

My suspicion is that these figures are for the population as a whole, and are therefore fairly meaningless.

I don't think they're fairly meaningless. They have limitations, but it depends on what your looking for and how you interpret them.

If you're looking at a picture of just how prevelent a problem is, and what is affecting a large group the most, the figures are representative of that. If you want an acurate picture of a specific situation, a different set of factors should be considered. I think these numbers are just meant as a broad glance at a large area with a big population.

Considering the medias' coverage of the tusnami and the coverage it gives of local natural disasters, and the concern of local citizens to spend resources on natural disater preparedness over other problems that have a more real impact in the local area, I think it's not a bad article and it keeps the whole picture in perspective.

I guess my point is people often ignore the gradual accumulation of risks in everyday life and overreact to rare events.

Maybe it's a good idea to spend more capital on traffic safety than earthquake preparedness (as an example). How about more resorces spent on mental health or encouragement of an active lifestyle? Wouldn't that save more lives in the long run?

We.., as I live in Colorado, I am not going to lose any sleep over tsunamis. But when I visit Carlsbad on the ocean in CA, I might give them some thought!

What I fins most interesting is that some 40,000 or so folks are killed in auto crashes in the US each year. However, auto crashes never make the headlines. Several 100 are killed in Colorado. Just a few folks are killed by lightning.

Yet, each year we have newspaper and TV spots continuously about lightning safety, but I never see a TV or newspaper spot about tailgaiting or speeding.

What I fins most interesting is that some 40,000 or so folks are killed in auto crashes in the US each year. However, auto crashes never make the headlines. Several 100 are killed in Colorado. Just a few folks are killed by lightning.

Yet, each year we have newspaper and TV spots continuously about lightning safety, but I never see a TV or newspaper spot about tailgaiting or speeding.

I agree! I guess that speaks to my point about everyday risks being ignored.

The media needs to exploit to sell. Front page stories need to grab attention. We like drama and bad news. We over estimate the dangers of dramatic, rare events.Stories can be over simplification by journalists that summarise on subjects they may know little about. The free market works against calm and thoughtful journalism. The free market gives an incentive to scare you. To be “on top of the news” leads us to overemphasize some risks. Instead of putting risks into perspective, we hype the interesting ones.

"We're more afraid of shark attacks than heart attacks and statistically that's wrong, it leads us to make statistically riskier choices. There are a whole range of potentially fatal hazards we should we worried about but downplay like the flu, medical errors, skin cancer and traffic accidents." says David Ropeik, director of risk communication at the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis.

I would add the risk of not getting the aerobic exercise that cycling provides and that prevents, (the number one killer) heart disease, outweighs the risks of injuries (that can happen) on a bicycle.

Add up all those odds and you get a 100 per cent chance of dying.

Add up all those odds and you get a 100 per cent chance of dying.

Well GG to that then. Might as well shoot yourself right now.

Add up all those odds and you get a 100 per cent chance of dying.

Do you realize that over 1/2 of all the people who have ever lived have NOT yet died?

Statistically, the odds are in our favor of NOT dying!

I just hate it when someone tells me I'm more likely to die because I ride a bike than they are because they don't ride a bike

Amazing figures.

Strange and silly statistics as others have pointed out. 1 in 4663 chance of dying while cycling is misleading. You have to multiply that figure by the number of people who own bicycles and ride regularly and divide it by the total population to get a meaningful figure. I'm afraid the resulting number will put you somewhere between suicides and car wrecks but hell you got to die of something. Ride carefully.

Come on guys/gals, no one table of statistics is going to completely capture the compexities of risk assessment for something as dynamic and changable as cycling. I mean, really, do these figures reflect the guys riding bmx bikes with rocket packs and drag chutes?

However, just because a set a statistics are not perfect, they still can be assessed. Just keep in mind the limitations of how the data were gathered and learn what you can from them. These figures, and virtually all data on the subject, have demonstrated that cycling is a very safe activity - certainly safer than riding/driving in a car.

These figures, and virtually all data on the subject, have demonstrated that cycling is a very safe activity - certainly safer than riding/driving in a car.

### SNIP FROM THE ARTICLE

And here are the lifetime odds of expiring from some specific
causes of death, based on official tallies:


Car accident ... 1 in 247

Riding a bike ... 1 in 4,663

###

these figures definitely do _not_ indicate that riding a bike is safer that riding in a car. they dont tell you anything useful at all.

Being in a car accident is very different from riding in a car. and this does not provide a basis to compare deaths of people riding bikes. maybe deaths from bike accidents could be compared to deaths in car accidents. but even then, it just isn't the same thing, is it?




marty

these figures definitely do _not_ indicate that riding a bike is safer that riding in a car. they dont tell you anything useful at all.

If you don't agree with the article, maybe you can email Richard Morin at the Post and have him explain the article and what it means.

It might help in understanding his point of view put forward.

I just hate it when someone tells me I'm more likely to die because I ride a bike than they are because they don't ride a bike

I just remind those folks that they're far more likely than I to die of getting fat and lazy. That tends to end those conversations quite nicely...

I just remind those folks that they're far more likely than I to die of getting fat and lazy. That tends to end those conversations quite nicely...

Me too. I usually say, the leading cause of death under 45 years of age is car accidents, the leading cause of death over 45 years of age is heart disease, so we'll see who dies first. (that's in Canada)

As I said,

I would add the risk of not getting the aerobic exercise that cycling provides and that prevents, (the number one killer) heart disease, outweighs the risks of injuries (that can happen) on a bicycle

If you don't agree with the article, maybe you can email Richard Morin at the Post and have him explain the article and what it means.

It might help in understanding his point of view put forward.

it is one thing to have a point of view. i dont necessarily disagree with the point of view.
the stats are crap.

the stats are not useful for backing up the claim that cycling is safer that driving a car. the stats presented here dont say that at all. one needs to be careful about drawing conclusions from stats - they have a context and bike riding wasn't it.

the stats were presented for the purpose of drawing a conclusion about the relative threat of death from some catastrophic event vs some ordinary daily event.

### SNIP FROM THE ARTICLE

And here are the lifetime odds of expiring from some specific
causes of death, based on official tallies:


Car accident ... 1 in 247

Riding a bike ... 1 in 4,663

###

these figures definitely do _not_ indicate that riding a bike is safer that riding in a car. they dont tell you anything useful at all.

Being in a car accident is very different from riding in a car. and this does not provide a basis to compare deaths of people riding bikes. maybe deaths from bike accidents could be compared to deaths in car accidents. but even then, it just isn't the same thing, is it? marty

Marty,
I've been trying to decipher what you mean by these sentences. I think that deaths from car accidents ARE being compared to deaths from bike accidents. Unless there is another way to die in a car or bike that could tilt the numbers dramatically? These figures come from the National Safety Council, derived
from 2001 data from the National Center for Health Statistics and the U.S. Census Bureau. Pretty reputable sources, I'd say. Seems a bit presumptious on your part to just dismiss them out of hand without offering an explanation of what their faults are.

Regarding the relative risks of car vs. bike travel, I invite you to familiarize yourself with the relevant studies and findings. With respect, your opinion will be more respected when it is informed. If you can find a study with better methods or sources than this one that supports the idea that bikes are more dangerous than cars, i think that many people here would love to see it.
.

Marty,
I've been trying to decipher what you mean by these sentences. I think that deaths from car accidents ARE being compared to deaths from bike accidents.
.

no they aren't.

they are comparing deaths from car accidents with death from bike trips
you dont have an accident everytime you ride your bike - do you?

Marty,
Regarding the relative risks of car vs. bike travel, I invite you to familiarize yourself with the relevant studies and findings. With respect, your opinion will be more respected when it is informed. If you can find a study with better methods or sources than this one that supports the idea that bikes are more dangerous than cars, i think that many people here would love to see it.
.

you made the claim that the stats presented support the view that bike riding is safer than driving a car. that may well be the case, but the stats in the article presented previously neither support that nor refute that. they are just a collection of stats presented to support the view that the risk of death from major catastrophy (eg, tsunami) is significantly less than what one faces ordinarily.

And here are the lifetime odds of expiring from some specific
causes of death, based on official tallies:


Car accident ... 1 in 247

Riding a bike ... 1 in 4,663


Marty,
But... don't these numbers support (but not prove) the idea that bike riding is safer than a car? I don't know how these figures were arrived at, but these numbers are still evidence, right?

And here are the lifetime odds of expiring from some specific
causes of death, based on official tallies:


Car accident ... 1 in 247

Riding a bike ... 1 in 4,663


Marty,
But... don't these numbers support (but not prove) the idea that bike riding is safer than a car? I don't know how these figures were arrived at, but these numbers are still evidence, right?

we dont really know much about it at all really.
there is no common denominator here. we need to know either how many deaths per car trips or how many deaths per bike accidents. you just can't say from these figures one way or the other.

and frankly, how can you know the total number of bike trips. you probably can know the total number of car accidents to a point, since there are insurance claims against them or traffic reports. but most people dont go to hospital, police or other when they have a bike accident. which i suspect is why the figures are not directly compared. the figures for bike accidents are hugely skewed because most bike accidents go unrecorded.

Marty,

This study is a good example of what scientists call converging evidence. Every study, including in the physical sciences like physics, are flawed in some way. Social sciences and dynamic situations like cycling present more difficult challenges. But skilled researchers capture something of the reality of the variable under study. So, when trying to understand a phenomenon under study, one must look to see whether the results of the available good studies converge or diverge (dispute) each other. Because each, individual study is flawed, it is incautious to accept or reject a premise on these single outcomes.

Now, as you will see if you dig around a bit, there are many legitimate, empirical, attempts to understand and quantify the risks associated with auto driving and bicycle riding. The preponderance of results indicate that bicycling is much safer than driving.

Well, to be fair, that's the chance any American will die from bike riding, including all those Americans who don't ride bikes!

What's more useful is to look at the chances any given American cyclist will die while riding a bike.

What's even more useful is to look at what the chances are for every hour a cyclist rides.

You can glean much by noting that the chances of death are much higher for children cyclists than for adult cyclists (probably because adults are much more likely to know and follow the rules of the road - to ride vehicularly).

Finally, looking at the chances per hour based on how you ride (riding with or against traffic, on sidewalks or on roads, etc.) is the most informative. And that's basically what Forester does in the book Effective Cycling.

Alas, studies that would look at all the truly relevant details have not been done.

Serge

Serge, I would guess that the suicide number is also the odds of someone being successful, as opposed to all those that tried. I think the number for cyclists might be accurate, since the about 600 deaths per year from cycling don't multiply out to our population.

the stats are crap...one needs to be careful about drawing conclusions from stats - they have a context...the stats were presented for the purpose of drawing a conclusion about the relative threat of death from some catastrophic event vs some ordinary daily event.

There seems to be a contradiction in your statement.

You say the stats are crap, but you seem to agree that it shows the relative threat of death from some catastrophic event vs some ordinary daily event. It seems you agree with part of the stats.

There is the statistical pattern of predictable probabilities.

If the sample is large enough, (and using an entire nation's yearly results for several years is a large sample) there are statistical regularities that can predict with some accuracy outcomes in the future.

Insurance companies come up with tables based on this pattern.