The Chainlink

One week later I get into a bike/car collision for a second time riding home tonight

Some of you will remember I wrote last week about escaping death when a car pulled a u turn unannounced in front of me.  Tonight I got hit or more accurately my bike did.  I am fine  but shaken.

I was riding west on Lawrence and stopped at the stop sign @Kenmore. A car then arrived going east bound.   I was first one at  the intersection so started going through. Suddenly the driver made a left turn, for which I was totally unprepared. Seeing this car come at me I kicked it in and he squarely hit the Orlieb bag on my left rear tire. The bag went flying but I stayed on the bike and was not hit.  

At least the young driver pulled over and apologized profusely.  I checked my laptop and it was fine.  I had a bag with power adapters and accessories in my orlieb and I believe that took the blow.  I didn't even ask for the guy's  info as I was so pleased he waited to see that I was OK.  Noticed on my ride home that my tire was flattened due to the collision.

I should point out that I had no headlight on tonight  as the batteries died yesterday and I mistakenly brought the wrong sized replacements to work today.  . But that's no excuse for him rushing the turn. I don't believe he had his lights on. I did have my helmet on and a blinking tail light.

After last week's incident I did order a light for my helmet but it didn't arrive yet.

This definitely spooked me. All I can tell everybody is that these incidents  happen very fast and you have little or no time to react.  So you must be highly visible and watching all nearby drivers.

I may not ride next Friday night.):

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Permalink Reply by BikeScnhook on October 6, 2015 at 10:00pm

Man, that's scary. I had my first collision last Thursday because, well, I'm an idiot. Brakes were giving out and I figured it'd be safe for one more ride -- I planned to take my bike to Village Cycle Center the next day for my free tune-up and have them fix the brakes while they were at it. I was heading south on Clark Street just past Southport, and a guy made a right turn in front of me (and he signaled), and that's when my brakes decided that they would no longer function. I hit the car and ended up face-down on the pavement.

I was okay, just a couple of bumps and scratches...and the guy whose car I hit was super-nice about it. But yeah, from now on, I think a good indication of needing new brakes is if I suddenly no longer feel like I'm going to fly over the handlebars when I brake. I walked the two and a half miles back home, told the coworkers I was working from home, and took the bike to Johnny Sprockets the second they opened and got a new set of brakes.

BTW, Josh, I see things like you described all too often: sudden unannounced u-turns (usually by cab drivers) nearly killing someone. Saw that a few months ago actually on Wells Street in Old Town. The guy who nearly got killed rightfully yelled at the driver....then proceeded to zoom right through a stop sign and almost take out a pedestrian...ughgh...

Permalink Reply by Steve G on October 8, 2015 at 1:04pm

Did you make a police report?

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