Deadly motorcycle crashes, and drivers who cause them

Motorists should embrace responsibility in bikers’ safety, says Lorraine Sommerfeld.

Two weeks ago, at 7:30 a.m., a motorcyclist in Burlington, Ont. suffered life-threatening injuries when a car turned left in front of him.

Later that night in the same city, a motorcyclist was killed when an SUV turned left in front of him.

The next day, an Oakville driver was charged with making an unsafe left turn, causing a motorcyclist to be violently thrown and severely injured; the rider and bike ended up 40 metres from the point of impact.

The same weekend in New Hampshire, seven members of a motorcycle club — the Marine Jarheads, made up of marines and their spouses — were killed when a pickup towing a flatbed crashed into them on the highway.

The 23-year-old driver has been charged with seven counts of negligent homicide, though his driving record was already a disaster.

He’d been charged with operating a vehicle under drugs/alcohol in May (cops found a crack pipe on him), and he had a rollover in Texas earlier in June.

His licence should have been revoked, and the Registrar of Massachusetts’ motor vehicle division (where the trucking company he drove for operates from) has resigned.

I’ve taken so many advanced driver training courses over the years, I’ve lost count. But the motorcycle training I took remains the most memorable, the most sobering, and the most valuable.

You truly understand just how vulnerable you are, no matter how much bike you buy, no matter how much you invest in leathers and safety gear, no matter how much you spend on a helmet.

You learn to drive as if everyone around you is trying to kill you.

As for the idiots who insist on weaving in and out of traffic on their crotch rockets, there’s a famed biker adage seemingly lost on the young: “There are old motorcyclists. There are bold motorcyclists. But there are no old, bold motorcyclists.”

Eight years ago I cut a motorcycle off, and I wrote about it. I was shaking as I wrote it, and reading it again is still just as visceral as when it happened. I heard from riders around the country, and braced myself for the fallout.

Instead, I got thank yous for admitting I’d made a mistake and put that rider in danger. Apparently, riders are not used to drivers owning up to their own mistakes.

Any motorcyclist will tell you that someone in the opposite direction making a left turn puts them on even higher alert.

Left turns, in general, are one of the most deadly moves we make every day; they make anything smaller — a pedestrian, a cyclist, a motorcyclist — nearly invisible.

A New York City Department of Transportation study sums it up thus: “Left turns are more dangerous than right turns for three main reasons: left turns can be taken at a wider radius, which leads to higher speeds and greater pedestrian exposure, the driver’s visibility is partially obscured by parked cars and the vehicle’s A-pillar, and left turns are more complicated than rights and require more mental and physical effort (“driver workload”) than right turns.”

Drivers can be so focused on finding their break in a flow of traffic that they fail to see pedestrians in a crosswalk, or other — smaller — oncoming traffic. The onus to prevent a crash is on the person making the left-hand turn.

Take an extra second to scan for pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists before you make a move.

It’s motorcycle season. Let’s get everyone home safely.