DMC707

Ouch!
I missed this part when i was speculating about perhaps not being drunk , but very tired. (I dont trust myself driving tired either, - i have totalled a vehicle before when i fell asleep behind the wheel with cruise control on and was lucky to have not been killed myself)

What time do the bars close in your area? Then again, i guess that doesnt really matter if a guy keeps a bottle or 2 at home, or in his car.

Im hoping this gentleman loses his license for a long long time, (sounds like he may lose his freedom for a while too, who knows). and again, so glad you are around to post your experience

AlmostTrick

Yet mcours was hit from behind, so clearly it was and is something to worry about. There are plenty of situations (like on my commute) where there are lots of overtaking traffic and very few threats from the front.

Understood about not wanting to post certain details.

When I notice an overtaking vehicle not moving left, I may do one or another things. Wave my arm, wiggle the bike, move left, LOOK BACK. There have been several times where these things have done the trick, and the motorist woke up and moved left. If I see them getting closer, without leftward movement on their part, I start to head for the edge... but not too soon. I don't want to encourage a buzz pass. This doesn't happen often, and I've been fortunate enough to never have to make a full bail... only glide right a bit to give myself some more clearance.

You have to do what's right for you, and frankly it sounds like you have a good handle on this.

Agreed. Sometimes one needs to pay more attention in front, other times to the rear. The beauty of a proper mirror is that you can switch back and forth quickly and effortlessly.

CB HI

I am not going to read the full 3 pages of whatever. Heard most of the back and forth before.

What works for me almost worked for you. I use an eyeglass mirror and check each motor vehicle that approaches until I know it will safely pass. The only mistake I would say you made was that you assume the motorist would pass safely. When a motorist raises concern for me that he may not pass safely, I already know there is nothing ahead of me that I will hit, so I focus on the guy behind until he moves over OR gets close to the point of no return. If the point of no return gets too short, I bail off the roadway. That has saved me from being hit from behind five times.

Get at least 3 estimates for your bicycle repair or comp cost of replacement and submit the top 2 estimates to his insurance (if he has insurance and if not go to small claims). Include a new helmet and replacement of any clothing and other accessories. Include disassembly of the bicycle and new paint job and then reassembly. Rent a bicycle to keep commuting until your bicycle is repaired. A weekly charge to the insurance for the bicycle rental gives the insurance a reason to settle sooner than later.

Document all injuries no matter how slight. Get written doctors report if you went to hospital or doctor visit. (just double checked and I see you are in Canada - will leave this in for others)

Check state insurance laws to see if no-fault coverage is required for the motorist.

Obtain police report as soon as possible and request corrections or supplements for any errors.

Do not let insurance adjuster give you any BS. Let them know you will go to small claims or go full law suit as needed if they are not fair to you.

wphamilton

I took him to mean the gambler's fallacy of maturity of chance. If you've flipped 7 heads, the next flip is still 50-50 but the "gambler" thinks that tails is more likely. Once struck by lightening, the "gambler" thinks that another is less likely, because lightning striking the same person twice is so improbable. But the chances are really the same as before.

So if this happened to him at random from his perspective, beyond his control to influence at the moment it happened, how does he reduce the chances of it happening again? That would be my question.

CB HI

+1 right on point

alan s 

If you stand under a tree during a thunderstorm, your odds of being struck by lightning go up. If you stay indoors away from windows, your chances go down. Same applies to riding a bike. It’s all about improving your odds. This is not a coin flip scenario.

mcours2006

Precisely, which is why I could not go back to riding without making some kind of change. I've already listed a few things I'd do differently, and thanks to some of you I have a few more ideas.

wphamilton

Almost. Some things you can control, some things are out of your control. From your perspective, sharing a given stretch of road with a drunk at 6:30 am is low probability but random. Whether he looks up during the several seconds he has to see you is random. Whether he happened to weave left or right is random. Which particular bit of road you're on at that moment is essentially random. From the drunk's perspective, that wasn't as random because the drunk could have chosen to change any of those elements.

The issue and why I emphasize with OP is that he was doing everything "right" to minimize the danger. Everything that everyone recommends for "visibility". Watching and aware. Probably riding in the same place and the same manner as would you or I. The random element, the "coin flip scenario" cannot be rationally denied.

The question I'd be asking is just how freakish was it? If I decided that it was really more probable (ie riskier) than I'd assumed before, then I'd have to alter things in addition to all of the "safety measures" that we depend on. Identify whatever it is (if anything) that made that particular road more likely for a driver like that to be on and avoid roads like that. Ride only at another time of day, or in other traffic conditions. Choose only roads which leave me an escape route at every point. Those ideas seem extreme, but if you decided that the risk from purely random circumstances are too great for that particular riding, then you are forced to alter the circumstances which you allow yourself to be exposed to.

Denying probability and chance might help psychologically to regain one's confidence, but it won't reduce the actual risk and I doubt that someone who refers to "maturity of chance" is likely to be reassured that way.

Skipjacks

What specific things will you do differently?

I've never been run over. I value the opinion of someone who has. Maybe I'll make certain changes now before I feel obligated to after being hit myself.

mcours2006

Here:

alias5000

@mcours2006, I am so sorry that this has happened to you! I wish you the speediest recovery that can happen for whatever you are going through. I have been having a great time sharing winter bike tips over this forum this winter with you. The garden sprayer is one of these things and it is working quite well for me.

Take your story and replace 'bike' with 'car' and I would have the same story for you. It happened to a friend of mine a few years ago - car was done afterwards. He's still driving - that's the good thing... ;-)

Skipjacks

I definitely do the sidewalk riding already for certain stretched.

Some cyclists are adamently against it 100% of the time. But I have 1 stretch that's down a road that would be suicide to bike in, with a perfectly good sidewalk next to it. It's through an industrial park so there's ZERO foot traffic. I don't even know why they put a sidewalk there. But they did. And it makes for a pedestrian free safe bike ride. So I use it rather than ride in the street of death next to it.

mcours2006

Likewise. I'd much rather be start a thread about cleaning my bike than one like this one.

noglider 

I'll tell you my approach as someone who was hit very badly. It may be of use to @mcours2006, but I don't know, and our situations might be different.

It was a long time ago. I was about 21 years old. I'm 57 now. I was riding to work, and ... I woke up in the hospital, in a lot of pain. I was hit head-on by a car. The last moment I remember was that I was about to left into oncoming traffic, so it may have been my fault. But why would I turn in front of a car? Maybe I did, and maybe I didn't. I'll never know.

The only lesson I can take and use is that I might not be as alert as I think I am, and anything that happens might be somewhat or totally in my control. Every time I make a mistake or just have a near-hit, I think hard about what I might do differently. I've had some minor crashes since my big crash, and I try to replay them in my head humbly.

AlmostTrick

I like this and subscribe to the same. My big crash was 10 years ago, where I made a mistake and knew it was my fault. This made dealing with it afterwards somewhat easier, I think. Don't ever do that again! Now go ride.

To know and/or hear that I did everything right would leave me feeling somewhat helpless, like there wasn't much I could do to prevent a collision, which is seldom true. We always have %100 control over our actions, and like they say, there's always room for improvement.

I too analyze traffic and road situations often, and play them out in my head... on the bike and in my car. Threads on BF can also help with this, because it allows us to study and learn from other collisions or situations, while tapping into many years and thousands of miles of cyclist experience.

CliffordK

I'm going to have to disagree. But, there are many different situations.

Cresting a hill, or going around a corner, a driver may only have a couple of seconds to react to a cyclist that suddenly appears in front of them.

On the other hand, on a long straight stretch, there may be quite some time between first spotting the cyclist and reacting to their presence.

Yes, one typically isn't reading texts on corners... but...

Likewise, with a deserted country road, the bike will stick out a mile ahead. In heavy traffic, there will be headlights and taillights to contend with, flashing turn signals, and one's view may be obscured by other vehicles.

Also, on a deserted straight road, one can safely move one's vehicle into the opposite lane to pass. For curves, or in heavy traffic, one's passing choices are limited, and either one has to pass in the same lane, or slow down to bicycle speed.

One of the issues in this case was that the driver was intoxicated, and likely drowsy. Getting home after a late night?

Unfortunately a drowsy/intoxicated driver may not react in the same manner that one might otherwise expect. Their reaction times will likely be slower. So, while an awake sober driver might react quickly to suddenly seeing a bicycle ahead, it may take more time for the drowsy drunk to identify that it is a bicycle, and to react to the bike's presence. Thus, anything that obscures the bike could be very bad.

Then there is the issue of tracking towards the object. This is a major problem as that there is no safe spot on the street. Perhaps the car interprets the bicycle as a car moving in their direction at their rate of travel? This is also a reason I prefer flashing lights to steady lights. I don't want to look like just another car in the distance.

Personally I think excessively bright lights can exacerbate the problem of tracking towards the light, like a moth to a light.

I experienced this once, and it was downright scary. At the tail end of a long ride. My primary light had been stolen, and I was running on low intensity backup lights, and would turn them off when there was nothing around. Except I hit some kind of unseen animal in the road. It took me down quickly, and injured my arm. So, 40 more slow miles at night with an extremely sore arm. Then on the last 5 miles or so, I hit morning traffic, and they blasted me with their high beams. It was all I could do to not head into the light. The best thing to do was to pull over and stop, except that restarting was painful.

Anyway, a bike's taillight should not be any brighter than the average car's brake/turn lights. Don't run some super-bright daylight taillight after dark. You don't want to blind the drivers behind you.

CliffordK

@mcours2006 still hasn't mentioned the type of road or lane positioning at the time of the accident. I'm a firm believer of ride where the cars aren't driving. I.E. Riding on road shoulders, bike lanes, edge of the road, etc. Yes, I'll get a few close passes. But, the cars can generally safely pass me whether or not they actually see me. If they can't pass me, then they're already headed to the ditch.

Slamming one one's brakes, or taking extreme evasive maneuvers can be dangerous for the cyclist, the car and passengers, as well as other traffic on the road.

In this case, don't expect a drowsy drunk to perform those actions flawlessly. Likewise, if a person is playing on the phone, then glancing up and down, they can react quicker, or perhaps even not at all, if the bicycle isn't directly in their driving path.

Should the car choose to pull over with the center of the vehicle over the center line, it is both quicker and easier for the car to pull over a half car's width, and they can return to the normal driving lane quicker and thus safer for all road users.

SHBR

Lane position was right tire track if I recall.

Driver was impaired, OP was not aware of this before the crash. (probably impossible to tell)

I'll take a guess that the OP had not had many close calls prior to this incident, certainly was not expecting to be hit.

I'm more wary of light traffic than I am of heavy traffic, motorists tend to get overconfident on open roads, causing maximum damage.

mcours2006

Here is a Google street pic of the exact location:
IMG 002.jpg

Here's what it looks like typically, the past month or so when there's been snow fall.
IMG 001.jpg

This is why sidewalks are going to become an option for me in the future.

mcours2006

No, you're right. I haven't had many 'calls' that I would consider 'close', but I take that as a credit to my own vigilance.

My sentiments exactly.

SHBR

That road looks yucky, not much room to move.

Years ago while driving, I avoided being rear ended by moving into the far left lane on a twisty mountain road, after pulling out of a blind driveway.

As a cyclist on a quiet road, your ears may also give you some indication of motorist intentions. (slowing, accelerating, lane change etc.)

AlmostTrick

Except there is a shared center left turn lane. In my experience this makes it a lot easier for motorists to pass a cyclist, as they don't fear using part of this lane. I like this situation and typically increase my right side buffer while riding there... to encourage them to move out of the travel lane. As a bonus, any motorist who doesn't move left stands out and is immediately noticeable.

alan s 

Don’t know if the picture of the snowy road represents the condition it was in when you were riding, but that is marginal at best. Any car passing looks like it would be forced to drive on ice, in the middle and left to get around you on the right tire track. So there is really no safe way to pass a bike. Nonetheless, some will try to pass anyway, and that where you run into problems. I probably would not ride on that road in that condition.

canklecat

You did nothing wrong and took every reasonable precaution.

The driver was drunk and impaired from lack of rest after an all-nighter of boozing it up. It's that simple. His license should be suspended for at least a year, in addition to any other penalties.

If you really feel the need to do something more, pressure the local authorities to increase patrols of areas where patrons leaving late night bars are most likely to drive. My favorite rural route has several h0nky t0nks and strip clubs along a 5 mile or so segment. Lots of broken glass from liquored up, pissed off yahoos leaving drunk late at night, weaving around the road, blasting through red lights and stop signs. Easy pickings for patrol officers. Yet I rarely see any law enforcement at all around that length of country highway.

Some areas are death traps from this type of scenario. I suspect the main reason law enforcement doesn't do more to curtail drunk driving is because the bars and strip joints generate tax revenue in rural areas with few other businesses. So cops only respond to collisions rather than taking preventive action by patrolling more visibly between 9 p.m.-6 a.m.

unterhausen

I hate roads with long straight stretches. Invitation for people to put their heads down in their phone.