Originally Posted by
I-Like-To-Bike
Who on this planet, with normal hearing cannot hear an emergency vehicle siren (or train whistle, car horn) no matter what kind of headphones being worn? Your scenario is just baseless fear mongering.
I would seriously dispute this - what proof is there that wearing earphones, listing to audio, does
not distract you or take away from your ability to react in time? It is not fear mongering. Not only do you take away one very important sense (hearing), but your attention is diverted to audio. Distracted cycling can be just as deadly as distracted driving.
There was a huge debate in this forum last year about earphones, headphones, blah, blah, blah... I'm in the camp that unless you're really, really in the middle of nowhere, you're better off paying attention to the road, especially if you're on a bike, which does not happen to have an integrated safety cage, impact crumple zones, and strategically placed air bags to help rescue you when you make a mistake.