Passes & Canyons Blog

Rolling the victim to slip something under them to slide them to safety. Note the attention to stabilizing the head and neck.

If your buddy goes down or you just happen upon a crash scene, and you’re the first one there, the number one thing you need to do is make sure no one–including yourself–suffers further injury.

I recently attended an “Accident Scene Management” class and all this information comes from that.

The first person you’ve got to take care of is yourself. You’re not going to help matters at all if you get hit by a passing vehicle and end up needing assistance yourself. So park safely, with your flashers on, and then go to assist. When you park be sure to leave room for emergency vehicles when they arrive. If there are other people in your group, designate the one with the most training or experience to be in charge. If you have flares or lights or anything to catch attention, deploy those things.

If there’s more than just you you’re going to want to control traffic. Station someone at least 100 feet up the road in each direction, and if you’re at a curve make sure that person is around the curve enough to alert other drivers before they come screaming along. Same with a hill. In town, have them go to the two intersections ahead and behind.

The next part of the training talks about protecting yourself from disease transmission. They say to put on gloves and a face mask. If you’re on your bike you’ll probably already have gloves and helmet on so it would make sense to leave those on. Frankly though, if I see someone bleeding profusely I doubt I’m going to take the time to struggle to slip on some latex gloves.

We’re proceeding now in terms of a motorcycle crash. If the bike is laying on the person you first want to get it off. Besides the weight of the bike and the injury that can cause, they might have their leg pinned against the blazing hot exhaust pipe. Get that thing off them. I won’t waste space here telling you how to lift a bike; you should already know how to do that.

Do you move the person? That depends on potential danger. If you move them there is the possibility you will cause further injury. But if they’re in the middle of the road and you’re the only one there and there is traffic on the road you’ve got to get them off the road. Be aware that every state has “Good Samaritan” laws so don’t worry about being sued for trying to be helpful. But if you don’t absolutely have to move them, don’t. Emphatically, don’t.

If you do have to move them, your method will depend on how many others are there to assist. If you’re alone, reach under from next to the head, grab them by the armpits, cradle their head and neck with your forearms, and pull. If you have assistance you can support their head and neck and roll them over enough to slip a blanket or something under them and them pull on the blanket. The blanket makes it slipperier. The key is to support the head and neck and try not to move the spine. That’s the really big thing, the spine. And that’s why it’s best not to move them at all unless you have to.

Especially if you’re the only one there and you have to leave to get help you will want to–if it’s safe–put them into a position so if they puke–a definite possibility–they don’t suffocate themselves doing so. You’ll want to roll them onto their side with an arm under the head and one leg extended as a “kick stand.” With the person facing downward, any puke will pour out their mouth rather than filling their throat and suffocating them.

Obviously, all these movements are based on your assessments of the situation. If the person is conscious and can talk and they’re moving themselves you have a lot more assurance that the neck and spine are not at issue so you can be freer in what you do. If they’re unconscious you just have to do what seems to make the most sense.

There’s a lot more and I’ll get into that in my next post.

Biker Quote for Today

I got a motorcycle for my wife last week. Best. Trade. Ever!

This is a sponsored post from Robert Reeves, an experienced motorcycle accident lawyer who can help individuals with their legal troubles if they have been personally injured on their motorcycle.

I owe this heads-up to Fasthair, who, in response to my post asking “Why Are All These Bikers Dying?,” sent me the link I’ll give you momentarily.

I’ve mentioned here a couple times now that a new motorcycle crash study has gotten underway to update and tell us more about this subject than the 30-year-old Hurt Study can do. What I had not heard is that due to funding issues, it is currently dead in the water.

The study is to be conducted by Dr. Samir Ahmed, who is a researcher in the Transportation Center at Oklahoma State University (OSU). Federal matching money was put up with privately raised money and theoretically the study was underway. I reported previously that selected intersections in Los Angeles were being equipped with recording and sensing devices so as to gather crash information, and it looked like things were rolling.

Not so. As Jeff Cobb with Motorcycle Safety News reports, Dr. Ahmed cannot move forward with the study because Alan Tree, associate dean for research at OSU’s College of Engineers, Architects and Technology, is concerned that there is not enough money, and that his department would be forced to make up the difference if the project ran out of cash before the job was done.

All in all a very distressing situation that Jeff Cobb explains in detail.

Another comment on the same post came from Torch, who said in regard to the questions I was raising, “Very good questions. We could use a compiled list of frequent mistakes, what to watch for, and how to avoid those situations.”

Well, as I noted in that post, I see an unending stream of headlines about biker accidents and deaths, so in the last week I have kept track of them all. The following list is representative but not all-inclusive. I follow the headline with the explanation from the article that tells the story.

• 1 Killed, 2 Hurt in Motorcycle Crashes — motorcycle rider tried to veer in front of another vehicle but instead impacted the front bumper of the car/veered in front of another motorcycle; motorcycle rider had been racing
• Buddy Lee Cole injured in motorcycle-truck crash — truck turned in front of him
• Motorcycle driver dies after colliding with backhoe — driver of a backhoe failed to yield while turning
• Rogersville Man Injured When Motorcycle Flips — riding veered off Lonesome Pine Trail and flipped – lost control of the motorcycle after swerving to avoid a white car that he encountered on his side of the road in a curve
• Lafayette Motorcycle Accident Kills One — collision with a van traveling southbound who turned into its path
• Motorcycles Hit 18-Wheeler; Both Riders Injured — struck an 18-wheeler whose driver failed to stop at a stop sign
• Motorcycle wrecks claims life of Raleigh man — ran into a Jeep, speeding
• 3 die in separate biker accidents Saturday — rear-ended by a pickup’s driver; lost control
• Two killed in motorcycle crash — hit head-on by a minivan (that crossed center line)
• Motorcycle crash kills Repton man — lost control of his motorcycle
• Motorcycle accident in southeast Huntsville — lost control of his bike and ran into a deep ditch
• Tecumseh woman killed in motorcycle crash — crashed into the rear of a van
• Madison County man dies in motorcycle accident — entered Quarterline Road into the path of a southbound Jeep
• Biker dies after city crash — collided with a blue Toyota Carina which was trying to perform a U-turn
• One Dead After Motorcycle Crash — rear-ended rider
• Wister man killed after crashing motorcycle into wooden post in LeFlore County — running his motorcyle off a LeFlore County road and crashing into a wooden post
• Fatal Motorcycle Crash in Dallas — speed may have caused him to lose control and slam into a wall

OK, that’s enough. Mind you, that’s only about half of what I collected in one week, pretty much in chronological order. What do we see there?

We see several of the accidents we all know occur, where a driver turns left in front of a bike. The surprising thing we see is that many of them do not involve any other vehicles, they are just cases of bikers who lose control and hit something. In a couple other cases the biker rear-ended someone else.

In other words, it is easy for us to say it’s “those damn cagers” who are killing us but at least in the last week it’s really more that we are killing ourselves. Was alcohol involved? In some cases, probably. Excessive speed was definitely involved in some. These are factors we have absolute control over.

I don’t know about you, but I love riding my bikes. As soon as I die, the fun is over. What choices are you going to make today?

Biker Quote for Today

If you want to get somewhere before sundown, you can’t stop at every tavern.

Redlegs went down on his bike recently and came out in pretty good shape, with only a separated shoulder. He attributes it to ATGATT. That stands for All The Gear, All The Time.

I’ll back up just a moment to explain that Redlegs is a fellow motorcycle blogger who I have never met but have communicated with a number of times via email and comments we have posted on each others’ blogs. We may actually have literally rubbed shoulders recently at the Top Gun event but didn’t know it until we saw that we had each been there and written about it.

So in another overlap, we both went up to Frisco to the Concours Owners Group rally recently, though I went on Monday and he went on Friday. My trip was fine. For Redlegs, however, things were not so fine. Approaching the Eisenhower Tunnel, he hit some black ice and went down, at high speed. Ouch.

Redlegs says he always does the ATGATT thing, and right now he’s pretty darn happy about that. I have to admit, I don’t. Certainly I understand that if you go down you’re going to be extremely happy to have been wearing every bit of protective gear you own. And referring to another voice, Mark Tuttle Jr., editor of Rider magazine, says in his July 2008 column, “Take it from someone who has left his share of skin on the pavement–you don’t want to.”

I understand this. I believe these guys. So why don’t I do it? And obviously I’m not alone in not doing it. Why do so many of us ignore what we know is good advice?

I’ll be honest. A part of me has never gotten beyond my youthful conviction that I’m immortal and really bad things just won’t happen to me. For another thing, I’ve been riding for about 19 years now and the only time I ever went down on one of my bikes was going down a gravel road at about 5 miles per hour when a big dog walked out from between two parked cars, right into my path. In a slow motion split second I nailed my front brakes, realized they weren’t going to be enough, and touched the rears. Down instantly. But other than a bruised shoulder I was unhurt and my passenger was also unhurt. And we were not wearing helmets, but that was OK because our heads didn’t hit the ground.

The fact is, I like riding without a helmet. First of all, it’s extremely pleasant, and is a large part of what I find so enjoyable about riding. Secondly, when I do wear the helmet it gets very uncomfortable, even painful, when I wear it for a long time. Now, regarding this latter point, it may be that I just need a different helmet. But I’ve had a number of helmets over the years and the same has been true for all of them. They hurt my head. That said, I always wear a helmet in winter, I usually wear one when I’m riding on the interstate, and at other times it just depends on the weather and how I feel.

As for other gear, like leather jacket and chaps and gloves, I wear them depending on the ride and the weather. I wear the jacket and gloves the most, quite a lot of the time. The chaps I primarily wear in winter, when I judge that the possibility for a spill is greater and when the extra warmth they provide is welcome. I have a good pair of boots and I wear them on long rides but if I’m just hopping on the bike to go to the gym I don’t bother.

I’m pretty sure there are a lot of guys like me. ATGATT is a great concept but we just don’t see it as realistic. So I’ve worked out my compromise. In bad weather I wear it all. The odds are just more heavily weighted toward a mishap in bad weather. When I’m just trying to get somewhere and make time, I wear most of it, particularly the helmet and jacket. At times like that, the enjoyment is not the primary focus of the trip so I just hunker down and go. When it’s cold I wear all of it. That’s simple; it keeps me warm. The fact that it would protect me in a spill is secondary, though not unimportant.

But when it’s a beautiful summer day and we’re out on a lonely two-lane road just taking it easy and enjoying the ride, I’m sorry, I don’t want to wear a helmet. I judge that the danger is slight and it’s just worth it to me to take that small chance. And remember: Last year about 42 percent of motorcyclists killed in accidents were not wearing helmets. That means that 58 percent were wearing helmets and they were killed anyway. Sometimes you just play the odds. Yes, sometimes you lose. But I think this Biker Quote for Today sums it up for me pretty nicely.

Biker Quote for Today

Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in one pretty and well preserved piece, but to skid across the line broadside, thoroughly used up, worn out, leaking oil, shouting HOLY CRAP!