Originally Posted by eskachig

You're just too close to the situation to look at it reasonably. A member of our community died. People are trying to figure out what happened, and debating if changing our riding habits would make it safer. Obviously he's an example, a case study. Talking like this is EXACTLY what we should be doing to understand the risks of our hobby. Putting him on a pedestal will not help prevent a similar tragedy. What's more, even if he did die as a result of an error in his own judgment does not make him a bad person, or diminish his contributions to the world around him. Everyone makes mistakes - most of us are only alive because we got lucky with ours.

My feeling is that he was riding behind the truck (drafting?) without brakes or a helmet and then crashed trying to avoid running into the back of the truck. According to witnesses the truck slowed and signaled before turning, so the deceased had time to realize what was happening and try to bail/swerve/something. Nobody saw a collision and the bike was without a scratch so it's quite possible that the driver didn't even know something has happened. That said, their routes are known, so it's strange that FedEx has not been able to produce a truck and driver.

Drafting vehicles is extremely dangerous, and should probably not be attempted - especially if you can't slow down at a faster rate than the object you're drafting. This is even more important when the object you're drafting is not aware of your presence. A bike with a front brake can slow down faster than a FedEx truck. A bike with only a rear brake cannot. In this particular case, a helmet probably would've done him more good though because it kind of sounds like he died as a result of an unlucky bail.

This is certainly a tragedy, like any death of a cyclist, especially one so young. We shouldn't close our eye at the facts though, and try to make sense of what has happened. It's very worrying that the driver of the truck has not been found.