K'Tesh

How many of us have hit/been hit by a motor vehicle?

Personally, I've been in more than one collision (in more than one type of collision)...
(and more close calls than I want to even try to remember)

jsdavis

Left hook for me... double parked car stopped at the crosswalk with 4-ways blinking (and also blocking the bike lane) made a left turn and caught my front tire with the back bumper behind the rear wheel. This was a 4-way stop so I was going pretty slow. Saw the car coming and managed stop just in time and duck-walk 3 or 6 inches backwards narrowly missing the wheel arch.

Motorist fled the scene. Called the police with the plate. No witnesses so my word vs motorists anyway if anything even turns up.

frozen fork

Smashed into the side of a taxi that pulled out in front of me. It was the evening, I was in a bike lane (rare here) and I was lit. I’m far better lit up nowadays :-)

Plenty of close calls though

tony_merlino

Left hook - 86 year old driver turned left from the oncoming traffic lane on the other side of the intersection, as I was going 27 mph straight (I had the green light). He left the scene, but came back as they were loading me into the ambulance. His first words to me were, "Why didn't you let me make my turn?" I guess he thought that, since I was on a bicycle, I could stop in about a foot or so when he turned in front of me. He was wrong. You should have seen what I did to his rear passenger door.

Jamesw2

Was hit by a pickup truck mirror. he was doing about 40mph in a construction zone. wearing a reflective vest on a partly cloudy day the dude had a full lane to his left but would not drive on the new pavement in the center lane. No road markings.
The State police wanted to give me a ticket for failure to stay to the right . I had to dig out the vehicle code book and give them the statute.

Fargo Wolf

Got hit turning left off a main road, onto a side street. The driver of the car who hit me, was turning left off the side street, onto the main road. He misjudged how fast I was actually going. When he first saw me, I was nearly a block away. He looked left to check for traffic coming from the other direction, but forgot to check to his right again to see how much closer I was. He pulled out and nailed me. I wasn't hurt, but the bike was a write off. It all got sorted out in good humor, as it turned out the driver used to cycle regularly in the 70s and was fortunate to be alive. He got hit by a bus while riding his bike.

dynodonn 

Never been hit by a car in my many years of cycling, collision avoidance has always been my number one goal while cycling.

gcottay

My only incident was unusual. I was in the left lane, stopped while waiting to complete a left turn, when hit from the rear by a car moving at about 40 MPH driven by a young woman who had skipped school to experiment with drinking. After the collision she fled the scene leaving her car's front license plate behind. I was unconscious on the road but bystanders took immediate action to protect me from other traffic. Though my helmet was shattered, my body, to the amazement of ER staff, survived without major damage. Although her parent's tried hard to avoid it, the judicial system gave the young woman an excellent opportunity to learn from her mistake.

Though this happened years ago, I still smile whenever I see a Snap-On-Tools truck. A driver used his, pulled broadside in the lane, to protect me from heavy traffic.

mikeybikes

I haven't ever been hit by a car, and I've been riding regularly since I was 15.

buzzman

In over 40 years of bicycling as an adult: The most serious collision I've had with a car was a dooring when a car stopped in the left hand turn lane suddenly threw open a passenger door and nailed me as I passed in the next lane. The impact knocked me across the lane to the curb, which I hit straight on, sending me over the handlebars and I did a nice shoulder roll as I landed on the sidewalk. As I was mid-roll I recall thinking I'd survived the worst of it when my right hip and thigh hit the fire hydrant I hadn't seen. Fortunately, nothing broke but oh, I had some bad bruises.

I've had a couple of what I would call "side swipes" due to lane drifting cars and vans but they were just "touches". Best one was a young woman in a convertible on her cell phone, who was very slowly pulling to the right as she passed me oblivious to her surroundings. I ended up rolling over the side of the car and landing in the back seat- my bike still clipped to my shoes.

Hey, but "bicycling is safe". Just as safe as walking down the sidewalk according to some posters in BF.

Digital_Cowboy

I was rear-ended a couple of decades ago while riding my mother's old 5-speed. I've been run off of the road by motorists and have had motorists get angry because they think I should be riding on the sidewalk or in what they think of as being a bike lane.

Of the last two one used his car in a threatening manner. Every time I crossed an intersection he would turn his car like he was going to run into me. The second one actually got out of his car and wanted to fight. In that case I was again on the sidewalk in an effort to put as much space as possible between the motorist and myself.

In both cases I kept traveling to an area where there were (hopefully) plenty of witnesses, in case I needed them.

BILLB58

Been hit twice, both times sideswiped by cars...........

first time car went thru no left turn red light at speed and made left turn....clipped me as I was crossing in crosswalk....hit and run...police never found despite description and partial license plate by witness........ broken/cracked ribs and road burn....light damage to bike..

second time was going up street.....car went thru stop sign at speed and rear fender clipped my left hip as he came up on me and thru me onto pavement......busted collarbone, dislocated shoulder which I popped back in as soon as I got up, and lots of road burns..... also hit and run
had to replace rear derailleur no witnesses, never located

Sixty Fiver

Been riding a bike for over 40 years and have had a few run ins...

Had a car come out of a blind alley and although I could not avoid hitting the car did manage to turn enough to not hit the car straight on and did more damage to the car than I did to myself or my bike.

Got clipped by a mirror from behind and I was riding well into the lane because of the bad road conditions and moving at a very high rate of speed which probably saved me from more serious injury as I was moving at traffic speeds... the impact did send me right and straight into what was more of a long sinkhole (and what I was riding to avoid) and ended up doing a nose wheelie on my fixed gear. Managed to get the back wheel down before I hit the lip on the other side and if I had hit that I would have been launched into traffic at 50 kmh.

Still have no idea how I did not end being road kill on this one... I put it down from reflexes developed from years of riding off road.

Also got clipped by a car that made a right turn and passed behind me too closely and quickly and it kicked my rear wheel out from under me but did not crash... the driver stopped, got out of his car and went after me for being on the road.

I wasn't always the peace loving and gentle soul I am now... I hope this driver remembers that if you clip a cyclist and are at fault, getting out of your car and starting a fight is not a very good idea as the cyclist might be just a little pissed off and have some mad skills off the bike.

Besides that... have had the usual share of close calls and just this morning an older guy who was in the through lane decided to make a sudden right turn in front of me but as he had just passed me and doe that a little closely my spidey sense was tingling... and when I can;t see the driver over the backrest I am always extra cautious.

Chris516

This was sort of like my first accident, when I was 14(1981). I was making a right turn. The vehicle also making a right turn, was driven by an elderly woman.

My second accident was, when I was 30, where I was broadsided at an intersection.

My third accident was when I was 40(just four years ago), when I was run off the road by an ignorant motorist.

My fourth accident was earlier this year, when I was in the left-turn lane and I got impatient with all the vehicles stopped in the intersection, only to end up being broadsided.

Mr Danw

The first time I was hit by a car I was about 4 years old riding my bike in our driveway. Some old lady mistook it for a narrow country lane and tried to squeeze past me pinning me between the coral pink Caddy and a rail fence. The second time I was hit from behind while riding to school. I've been lucky and not been hit since. I got it out of the way early.

WPeabody 

My bicycle got hit by a cab while I was walking it on a crosswalk in mid-town Manhattan in the early 80s. The cab was making a right turn on a green light and didn't want to wait for the pedestrians, so he was pushing his way through. I couldn't move out of his way fast enough because it was crowded. My bike's rear wheel got stuck under the bumper of the cab, and he would have probably destroyed my rear wheel if the other pedestrians didn't pound their hands on the cab's hood and tell him to back up. No damage done, other than some minor scuffs on the bike.

B. Carfree

The poll didn't include include the infamous "brake check", unless you count running into a stopped/parked car as the same thing. In over 450,000 miles, the only time I have been unseated by a car was when I was brake-checked. I was pleasantly surprised that I managed to stick the landing with a complete somersault and a one and one-half twist, in sandals no less, at age 50.

Of course I have had my fair share of contact, mostly of the scraped by mirrors or corner panel variety. None of those resulted in anything more than a minor involuntary course change for me. Being large, riding at a fairly good pace and having some athletic skills have really helped me minimize trouble.

Interestingly, the worst encounter I have ever had with a motorist didn't involve any contact at all. Many decades ago, a truck driver took exception to the fact that I was riding a bike on the road. After he air-horned me, he got out of his cab with a crow bar. I heard him and got off my bike. He stood there for a moment, realized that if he swung the crow bar I would probably kill him, and then got back in his truck. (I was in the last weeks of preparation for my black belt in Tae Kwon Do at the time and I really would have killed him if he had swung the bar. Better for both of us that he didn't.) Since I didn't want to sit in front of a truck driven by a madman who had just threatened me with a crow bar, I moved back to his door, hopped up on the step and asked him what the problem was. He sheepishly apologized and said he was just having a really bad day. It was 7:30 A.M. I wonder how the rest of his day went.

GriddleCakes

I counted my brake check as a right hook since the motorist was intending to turn right, but couldn't because the driveway that she was turning into was full (this was about a week ago). Other than that I've broadsided two cars, both as a result of riding too fast on the sidewalk, and both in my first summer of urban cycling (legally their fault, realistically both of our fault). I have been broadsided twice, once by a car merging into me trying to get into the turn lane while I was in the bike lane (a convertible, luckily, so he heard me yelling), and once by a gal whose foot slipped off of her brake pedal as I crossed in front of her in the crosswalk. And once I rear ended a car (moving, not parked) because I was riding like a complete and utter jackass; dude was really cool about it, even though I scratched his rear quarter panel with my handlebars.

hagen2456

Never been hit, but twice in my early youth I've hit parked or stopped cars. There have been a couple of close calls, of course, when I've been in places without bike infrastructure.

Some pretty scary stories being told in this thread.

v0_boulder

Never been hit very close, I have been victim to people pulling out in my lane. I still have problems with people turning right even though I am not in the right turn lane. Yeah the biggest one was some one pulling out from a business across the MUP to merge into traffic. I am really thinking about investing in cameras after this story maybe a contour facing rear on the seat post and a hd pro or contour on the handle bars.

Mithrandir

So I'm unsure if I should answer this. Technically yes I've been hit, but I was being an idiot at the time and was unaware of it. I was probably 16 years old, and I was salmoning fast on a sidewalk on a busy street with lots of driveways. Naturally, I came upon someone making a right turn who did not look right, and decided to pull out while I was in front of his car. I knew it was going to happen, I was looking at him and saw that he had no idea that I existed, but for some reason I decided to go anyway. No damage to myself, but the rear wheel got bent out of true pretty badly.

Regardless, I didn't really consider myself a cyclist back then, just a kid without a car. In 2005 I took up cycling for real and learned how to interact with traffic properly, and I haven't had a problem in that entire time.

brumskee

Do pedestrians count? Last year while riding on the sidewalk (yeah, yeah I know, but since the side walk is the only sane place to ride this stretch and I was only going 10mph, give me a break) I passed 3 youths, one of which thought his friends would laugh when he knocked an old man on his ass. They were all chuckling pretty hard as I getting up and getting pissed. I told the one who did the assault that if he felt bad ass enough to bring it on and bring his 2 buddies with him. They did and about 30 seconds later thought it was not one of there better ideas. Moral of the story; don't mess with retired career Marine combat instructors who still do 200 push ups before their morning coffee.

v0_boulder

Semper Fi! awesome story I heard of an older retired golden gloves boxer giving it to his assailant in old meeechegan

sggoodri

Never collided with a car, but about 20 years ago I hit a pedestrian crossing the street between stopped vehicles. I don't filter forward in stopped traffic anymore because of that.

mikeybikes

Interesting story. Old man riding on the sidewalk beats up three punks who knocked him off of his bike. Not sure if either party was thinking correctly.