It is one year on from the collision caused by a driver that knocked Dan Walker off his bike and left him unconscious for 25 minutes, hospitalised with facial injuries and “glad to be alive”. Unbeknown to the TV and radio presenter, his subsequent social media post thanking the helmet he was wearing that “saved my life” and advising others “if you’re on a bike — get one on your head” would cause one of the great episodes in the well-trodden helmet safety debate path.
Now, 12 months on and looking back at the collision and aftermath, Walker explained to The Times newspaper how he did not ask the police to pursue charges against the driver as “we all make mistakes, don’t we?”
Dan Walker hit by driver on multi lane roundabout “wear a helmet!” pic.twitter.com/TrQyqzGoky
— Hackney Cyclist (@Hackneycyclist) February 22, 2023
“Within 24 hours I’d had drivers tell me that if it had been them, they’d have finished the job,” Walker recalled. “I had cyclists telling me I was a disgrace for saying that my helmet saved my life. ‘You’re the reason people wear helmets’. There’s a lobby, apparently, that says if you wear a helmet drivers think you’re safer than you are, therefore they hit you.
The helmet I was wearing saved my life today so – if you’re on a bike – get one on your head.
Smashed my watch & phone, ruined my trousers, my bike is a mess but I’m still here ??
Currently eating soup through a straw and being looked after by this gorgeous, tired nurse ❤️
3/3 pic.twitter.com/slELcbFJdL— Dan Walker (@mrdanwalker) February 20, 2023
“So I got people angry on all sides and I thought, ‘I don’t want to enter this. I’m very happy that I’m still around’. There’s a part of me that genuinely thought that was it.”
Walker went on to explain how the collision felt like an out-of-body experience, he was knocked unconscious for 25 minutes by the impact, and passed out again once he had come round, waking up in the back of the ambulance that attended the scene at a Sheffield roundabout.
“In my mind I was cycling down a French boulevard, a tree-lined boulevard, which I think I’d been to before but not on a bike. Then all of a sudden I was watching myself on the floor, watching a screen, and then on that screen I saw these two heads appear. And then I jumped back into myself and I was on the floor and those two faces were the ambulance workers. I don’t know. I don’t know…”
> Why is Dan Walker’s claim that a bike helmet saved his life so controversial?
Walker took up cycling in 2022 as “an eco thing” due to working in London where “taxis are a nightmare”.
“I started to get around on the bike,” he explained at the time. “I can go from Downing Street to St Pancras in about 15 minutes, and it’s about 30 minutes in a taxi so although I feel like a bit of a geek sometimes, I’m very much enjoying it.”
The BBC’s reporting of the incident which left him hospitalised was criticised by many, BBC South East claiming Walker had suffered his injuries after “colliding with a car while cycling” despite him saying he had been “hit by a car [driver]”.
In the aftermath Walker too was blamed for not using an underpass cycle lane and instead riding, perfectly legally, on the road. However, local cyclists defended the Classic FM presenter’s choice to avoid using the subway, which was described by one as a “dank tunnel” and “filled with broken glass”.
But it was Walker’s line, “don’t be a helmet, wear a helmet” that caused the most controversy as the former BBC Breakfast host seemingly innocently advised his large social media following to wear a helmet when cycling. A throwaway comment concerning the usefulness of his helmet?
The choice of focus on the personal protective equipment, rather than the main driving-related cause of the collision, irked some, while others took issue with the claim it had “saved his life”.
Numerous days of social media debating and an at-length feature on why the claim was controversial by this website followed, Walker now rather wisely concluding he was left thinking: “I don’t want to enter this”…
91 thoughts on ““I had cyclists telling me I was a disgrace for saying my helmet saved my life”: Dan Walker recalls helmet backlash after being knocked off bike by driver”
Instantly focusing on PPE
Instantly focusing on PPE rather than the cause of the crash was very unhelpful.
Maybe Dan Walker should listen to well-informed critiques rather than assuming he was 100% right all along.
Seriously? I swear we live in
Seriously? I swear we live in an age where people are expected to somehow give a completely accurate and objective view on events that are subjective and somehow manage to please everyone.
I would very much be focussing on the thing that might have saved my life after I had a nasty off. I wouldn’t be overly concerned about the big picture or the politics of either side.
Far too many people will pick at anything they can even if the person they are picking at has good intentions and is on their side. The police get this too if they dare suggest that cyclists can help themselves in any road safety matter. Yes it would be lovely if telling drivers to stop being utter twats around us worked but it largely doesn’t so anything I can do to protect or save myself from serious harm is a good thing. I don’t care what the world should look like, I care how the world is.
I will happily support a move towards a better world but I’m not going to wilfully put myself in harms way while we get there to prove a point.
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Very well put, mate. Ta.
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Very well put, mate. Ta.
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Thank god for a sane and
Thank god for a sane and rational comment on this one. The militant anti-helmet brigade do my head in (pun intended).
Ah the MAHB. They cause chaos
Ah the MAHB. They cause chaos round here – chaining themselves to railings, disrupting traffic, terrorising old ladies. They are all paid up members of the Cycling Mafia don’t you know. Or the Evil Cycling Lobby. Or both.
perce wrote:
Damn, I didn’t know you could be in both. Application form in the post.
mctrials23 wrote:
And yet, what was the trajectory of his comment praising PPE, if not to change how the world is (too few cyclists wearing helmets) to how it should look (all cyclists wearing helmets)?
Perhaps you meant that we should change the things we can (personal decision to wear a helmet) rather than wasting time wishing the world was different? That would make sense.
But as soon as you fly the PPE message on a blog it becomes the opposite, it becomes a wish to change the world. At that point, it’s no surprise if people take issue and argue that whilst we’re wishing for a better world that would be drivers not hitting cyclists rather than cyclists defending themselves against being hit.
No excuse for the ad-hominems of course.
What ‘well informed critiques
What ‘well informed critiques’? The so called experts on here?
Give me a break; nothing wrong with wearing a helmet, and people need to stop losing their minds when people advise people to wear one…..
In this particular case there
In this particular case there’s no reason to think the woman hit him because he was wearing a helmet, and pretty good reason to think if he’d had the same experience, but wihtout a helmet, he may have died or experienced a severe and permanent brain injury. The ‘stop victim blaming’ lot seem quite keen on blaming the victim when it suits them.
That doesn’t undo all of the other issues of cycling safety, and Dan’s injuries were nasty, in spite of the helmet. Dan was perhaps overly generous by not wishing to press charges, but he presumably knows more about the person and if he thinks she’s genuinely sorry and learnt her lesson then I’m not going to argue with him. Presumably she was breathalised etc.
It’s worth noting that if there was a possibility of a criminal case then Dan going public to blame the driver could have landed him in trouble and resulted in her getting off. That said, there was no excuse for the ‘colliding with a car’ reporting when there was plenty of evidence it was the other way around.
FionaJJ wrote:
I’m always torn on this point. We will never change drivers attitudes towards endangering others if we normalise bad driving and say “don’t worry, you didn’t mean to”. I think that most people who endanger cyclists don’t intentionally do it. They just don’t even think about it. They get past a cyclist and thats that. Had an argument with a guy who couldn’t fathom why I had an issue with his overtake (<30cm from my bars) because “I didn’t hit you”. He thought there was nothing wrong there.
He might even have said sorry and been genuinely sorry if he did hit me. Doesn’t change the fact his driving is fundamentally dangerous and we need to stop accepting bad driving, inattentive driving and criminally dangerous driving as a fact of life.
I’m torn too.
I’m torn too.
I’m generally a forgive and forget kind of person, and I think the world would be a better place if we held fewer grudges etc. I suspect Dan didn’t feel any need for personal revenge, or to shame the lady in question. This particular case making national news would be a factor too.
BUT, I agree that the prevailing attitude of too many drivers is that they don’t take enough care, with some very reckless driving socially acceptable. In that respect, I support the police taking more action in the hope it will eventually improve collective driving standards.
My point really was that I don’t like the way Dan is being harassed for wanting to move on. He was the victim, and he knows far more about this incident than myself or the internet commentators. And was already being abused by the anti-cycling lobby for being on his bike in the first place. Although as someone else says, the police could have taken action regardless of his personal views. I’d imagine a careless driving charge would be easy enough to prove and the onus shouldn’t have been on him.
We don’t have pressing
We don’t have pressing charges in UK law. Police and cps can bring a prosecution without the victim being involved as they can use other evidence.
And yet it does seem that in
And yet it does seem that in some cases the police leave it to the discretion of the victim – a sort of “we wouldn’t trouble our crime stats for this, but do you want to push it?” Happened to my sister who was presumably in shock at the time, on her way to hospital with broken bones after being hit by a cyclist.
How would Dan Walker et al
How would Dan Walker et al explain this from 20th Feb:
A lorry driver was found guilty of causing death by dangerous driving in relation to a “highly dangerous manoeuvre” that resulted in the death of cyclist Dr Krawiec who was wearing brightly coloured clothes and a helmet.
Did the cyclist die of head
Did the cyclist die of head injuries or from other catastrophic damage?
It was just to highlight
It was just to highlight survival bias, as cycle helmets aren’t designed to protect one from being hit, just a fall to the ground from cycling height.
So … that’s a “died from
So … that’s a “died from catastrophic injuries” then.
Depending on the type of
Depending on the type of truck (I suspect an N3G off road spec?) the victim will go under the front (a gap of at least 40 cm) and go under 1 or more 9 Ton axles. You need to be incredibly lucky to survive going under a wheel on a 9 Ton axle
A V Lowe wrote:
Yup. The only helmets that are designed to survive that are top spec motorbike crash helmets.
Why? Has he argued that
Why? Has he argued that wearing a hemet will stop a lorry from running you over or that it will save you if you get run over by a lorry? Or are just being a little bit silly?
I have used that cross roads
I have used that cross roads on regular journeys from Euston to Waterloo, and investigated several fatal RTC in the area
I have also had an identical move made by a truck driver to that which killed Dr Krawiec but a few years earlier
There were 2 identical fatal RTC in 5 years where drivers of large vehicles turned left from Vernon Place into Southampton Row, but despite only 2% of motor vehicles turneing left here it took a further 5 years to get left turns banned (and even then the sign is hardly visible)
The lane markings for every lane approaching the cross roads are barely 3 metres wide, but DfT’s own standards say that a 3.25 metre DKE is required for a bus or HGV travelling at 30mph
Heading South on Southampton Row there were 3 lanes marked at the junction, squeezed in after splitting up the 2 lanes coming down from Tavistock Square. Although the corener radius was ample for an HGV driver to turn from the left hand lane, many straddled or approached in the centre lane to turn left, and I had this with a 2-axle box van (7.5-18T HGV) as the driver came alongside and tried to turn left. I punched the nearside door & window, and strong words were exchanged, as I stopped him making the left turn
Finally (and a lot faster than for Vernon Place) the left turn lane has been made wider and the centre lane eliminated, which should be deliverd by the mandatory duty on Camden Council spelled out by Section 39 RTA1988 – to investigate RTC and take action to eliminate the hazards found
Let’s hope the Coroner at the inquest for Dr Krawiec calls for a Rule 28 report to confirm that actions have been taken to remove the embedded hazard here
I love my bike wrote:
Even this gets my gut, as it somehow implies that had she not worn the shit there’d have been some excuse for him….
I love my bike wrote:
Wouldn’t want to press charges, we all make mistakes, don’t we.
I love my bike wrote:
Because we all remember the safety Nazis claiming that a helmet and hiviz will save your life if a lorry runs over your torso, don’t we? Trying to co-opt the tragic death of Dr Krawiec in such an irrelevant fashion to support your argument is in extremely poor taste, to say the least.
Wearing a helmet did not
Wearing a helmet did not prevent the TBI I received.
What it did do, was stop the TBI from being far greater than it was and causing more than the small amount of cognitive damage I suffer as a result.
To that extent – the extent that I am in reasonable control of my faculties, still able to work and not in a catatonic or near catatonic state – my helmet saved my life.
And so did the paramedic giving me CPR for the 6 times my heart stopped.
Oldfatgit wrote:
You may find this research quite interesting then. It’s about the only real data on this contentious subject, done by actual experts on trauma and death.
The big issue is that the helmets won’t prevent harm denialists like to use an irrelevant example of where a helmet didn’t save someone to claim that helmets are pointless. Well of course a helmet won’t save you if your torso is crushed, but if the cause of death is a TBI, then that’s where the reseach above clearly shows it can be the differnce between life and death, or in lesser impacts the difference between a hospital visit and finishing ride before going to shops to buy a new helmet.
imajez wrote:
— imajezWow! Just WOW!
Yet another person who can say I know nothing about the subject without saying I know nothing about the subject.
So the MAIN thing people
So the MAIN thing people (including the writer of this story) has taken from this is the helmet debate. NOT the motorists saying they would have finished him off???
So the MAIN thing people
So the MAIN thing people (including the writer of this story) has taken from this is the helmet debate. NOT the motorists saying they would have finished him off???
Of course! Haven’t they been repeatedly told by those great organs of truth and the state, Telegraph and Mail, that cyclists are the worst people in the world and that their columnists would like to kill them all
Which is exactly what the
Which is exactly what the linked feature article was a very long-winded explanation of;
A helmet may well reduce harm in a collision, and it’s perfectly reasonable to be thankful of making a choice to wear one.
BUT it should not be detracting from the conversation of why motorists keep colliding with cyclists, and what can be done to stop the collisions happening in the first place
They’re vile idiots. What is
They’re vile idiots. What is to be gained by thinking about them? And what is to be gained by thinking about other idiots squabbling on sushul meejah?
picture of helmet that saved
picture of helmet that saved his life?
check12 wrote:
Probaby in pieces, which means it did very little.
Benthic wrote:
Except that’s how it is meant to work. The energy that broke the helmet was energy not trasnitted to you head. That’s like saying that a crumple zone in a car didn’t protect the passengers because it was all mangled.
imajez wrote:
No, its like saying that the crumple zone split in two and went either side of the tree that killed/injured the passengers, helmets are supposed to compress to absorb the energy of impact in the same way that crumple zones crumple to absorb it.
imajez wrote:
Except that’s how it is meant to work. The energy that broke the helmet was energy not trasnitted to you head. That’s like saying that a crumple zone in a car didn’t protect the passengers because it was all mangled.
[/quote]
How to say I know nothing about cycle helmets without saying I know nothing about cycle helmets.
Cycle helmets are supposed to work by aborbing energy by compressing the layer of polystyrene, which could absorb a significant amount of energy, not by breaking which absorbs very little. Take a piece of expanded polystyrene packing and try compressing it between your fingers, it’s difficult and takes a lot of energy. Now try snapping it, which is very easy and take relatively little effort.
Any helmet which has shattered has not worked as intended and has absorbed little energy, and provided very little protection. If you look at all the pictures in “helmet saved my life” stories, they are broken, with no evidence of compression, but people still claim it saved them.
All true.
I’ve never found the popular notion of “energy absorbed” much help in thinking about how helmets work. What energy, how much, where did it come from, where does it go, and how much is too much – all imponderables. And didn’t my head actually [i]lose[/i] energy by coming to rest?
Acceleration is much more accessible. Your head goes from velocity A to zero in x amount of time. That’s for a simple hit-the-deck type event. Obviously if your head is ricocheting around like a pinball there’s more maths to do.
Velocity A and zero are fixed. The only thing the helmet can do is extend time x.
Instead of coming to an almost instantaneous halt, the head is brought to rest over the distance (hence time) it takes to crush the thickness of the EPS. So it replaces a brief high acceleration with a longer lower acceleration. The key is to keep peak acceleration below the threshold the head/brain can tolerate. If that mechanism fails then the helmet has done very little.
The shell of the helmet is there to distribute the force of a point impact over a larger area to prevent the EPS being penetrated rather than compressing under load.
If the shell cracks open then it can’t prevent penetration. Unless the EPS compresses then it has not reduced the head’s acceleration.
posters below with chat but
posters below with chat but no picture…
I can’t remember seeing it,
I can’t remember seeing it, but wasn’t there video evidence of the collision itself?
I would think, based on the basic description of the incident, that the police would have at least issued a warning to the driver if not gone for points and a fine.
But not if DW “… did not ask the police to pursue charges against the driver as “we
all make mistakes, don’t we?” …”
Which kind of kills the point of having a driving licence, to make sure drivers don’t make potentially fatal errors.
(Yes, I know we don’t live in a perfect world where this is actually the case.)
“The BBC’s reporting of the
“The BBC’s reporting of the incident which left him hospitalised was criticised by many,…..”
Deservedly criticised. The BBC’s reporting of road safety frequently gives me palpitations, but if it put me in hospital, I’d be really annoyed.
The problem Mr Walker, is your acceptance that driving dangerously and almost killing someone is perfectly normal, which you then compounded by crediting your helmet with saving your life. I, and many others, profoundly disagree with you on both points, while in no way condoning personal attacks.
I mean, what is normal. If
I mean, what is normal. If its the behaviour that the majority of people engage in and have no real issue with then yes, dangerous driving is normal.
mctrials23 wrote:
And it should be addressed by the means society gives us for punishing wrong-doing, not airily dismissed with a wave of the hand.
mctrials23 wrote:
…which is what drivers want you and everyone else to think, including themselves.
A massive part of the problem is that drivers no longer see these things as wrong: they increasingly see themselves not as perpetrators, but as victims.
I’ve investigated a number of
I’ve investigated a number of RTC for lessons learned, and had a few myself. On one occasion I wrote off the car – when the driver rammed into my bike, and I survived with minimal injuries because I wasn’t wearing a helmet – although it was a little worrying watching the white line pass inches below my head as I cartwheeled past the side of the car. Not the first time either that not having a bulky enlarged head form has avoided more serious harm, allowing for a tuck in & roll, for example when I went over the ‘bars at around 30mph and did a double roll before getting up and cursing migthily after a loose strap on my front bag caught in the wheel. Rather like parachute jumping, in 60 years of cycling you fall off a few times and learn how to land without getting hurt.
The video clip is dark, but appears to show a lack of road awareness from both parties involved in the collision on their converging paths in the central lane on the roundabout, with the cycle being struck from the rear offside by the front nearside of the car, when the cyclist was moving closer to the centre of the roundabout and centre of that centre lane and the driver seems to be maintaining a steady position in the lane, but not reacting to the closing course with the bike
Facial injuries like those pictured are consistent with the peak of a helmet forcing back the head and pressing the soft fleshy (& full of small blood vessels which can bleed spectacularly) chin and cheeks into the tarmac. The testing of helmets also bears little relation to the typical real world crash of a face plant that is generally the most common type of cyclist crash (70% of tram track crashes are face plants from a number of studies – including Edinurgh and Toronto, and 50% of all the crashes are cause by the actions of another road user ‘distracting’ the cyclist from the hazard of crossing the rails – but that’s a whole article and research paper in itself)
The helmet drop test (& equivalent to a 12mph square-on impact) is nothing like the tangential impact at around 20mph, and the rotational forces on thoracic spine/& brain where 90% of body weight is forcing the head (10%) violently backwards
Tests in late 1940’s also established that the fused plate structure of the cranium is actually an excellent shock absorbing detail which is only at 30% of its strength in a 20mph square, flat plate impact (a helmest is around 160% past its catastrophic disintegration point at 20mph remember that KE & forces are multiplied twice over the speed difference)
A particular detail that is consistently missed by the ill advised focus on PPE is the road danger reduction culture:
– cyclists must learn the lifesaver, that is a detail drummed into motorbike riders, and ALWAYS be aware of what is happening behind you. Remember that Met Police crash investigators report that 80% of the fatal HGV-cyclist crashes, begin with the driver hitting the rider from BEHIND,
– with a high % of London victims being female, the findings from the 5000 cyclist study over a decade ago align with the reported detail that female cyclists said thay had difficulty looking behind, and also had more incidents arising from not knowing what was behind them. Several RTC details bear this out as well, and the picture released after the Bank fatal RTC (2015) shows how many such deaths arise
So watch the video again and ponder on whether Dan Walker was actually aware of the impending collision by checking behind as he moved into the lane ahead of the car driver
TL:DR – (I) it would far be
TL:DR – (I) it would far be better to ride and not to be hit in the first place; (ii) driver behaviour, especially around vulnerable road, users is the key.
If I express any anti helmet (anti hi viz) sentiments, it is because they are a distraction from the above and are the wrong side of that fine line between victim blaiming and crime prevention.
David9694 wrote:
Are you against helmets, or against people compelling others to wear them? Two totally different things.
I’m not sure many, if any, are actually against helmets or letting people choose whether they wear one.
Against compelling cyclists
Against compelling cyclists to wear them – a position which gets polarised into being “anti-helmet” by the “pro” brigade who are happy to see responsibility for safety passed on to others.
Hope that helps.
while I’ve got the mic: “no hard hat no work” ItSAYs at A Buiding site” –
great, let’s have a proper a Health & Safety safe system of work for the roads – let’s work out where the hazards are coming from and implement controls accordingly.
So for starters, that’s aGPS black box in every car (no speeding, no unqualified, drunk, shuts down if driving is inadequate, no MOT or insurance or if requested by police etc), mandatory driver competence re-tests every five years, disqualifications of many years’ duration for convicted drivers, proper recording and reviews of safety incidents with preventative actions taken, 20 mph limits anywhere there are people around.
When performing a risk
When performing a risk assessment PPE is the last resort – All other reasonable attempts at mitigating risks must first be taken before giving the instruction of wearing PPE, if those risks cannot be managed to a satisfactory standard.
Hi-viz and bike helmets are equivalently items of PPE. Therefore all other hazards must meet satisfactory measures before you blame the cyclist.
Was the vehicle fit to be driven (mechanically sound, insured, taxed etc)?
Was the driver in a fit state to drive?
Was the driver in full control of the vehicle, and driving in a safe and legal manner (to the speed limit, leaving sufficient gaps, not distracted?
Are the driving environmental conditions sub-optimal for control/visibility?
If all four questions above can be answered “Yes” then you can question whether the actions, or conspicuity, of the cyclist was a predominant factor in a collision. However this is somewhat a sliding scale. There’s a difference between a middling colour jacket and reflectors in daytime downpours and wearing all black with no lights in pitch black.
If the answer to any question was no, then the driver of the vehicle was at fault. Either by 1) driving a car that is not legally on the road, 2) illegally driving whilst impaired, 3) driving carelessly or dangerously, or 4) Same as 3, or just not looking where they were going. In those instances, conspicuity does not matter because either the car or driver should not have been on the road, or it would have been extremely unlikely that the driver would have behaved differently had a cyclist’s actions or conspicuity been different at the time of incident.
Matthew Acton-Varian wrote:
— Matthew Acton-VarianMany years ago, the Health & Safety Executive deemed that cycle helmets were not PPE, which our H&S “expert”* at Bristol City Council didn’t know, but he still forced through helmet compulsion on council business.
*No he wasn’t.
David9694 wrote:
This.
Banksman required when
Banksman required when reversing…
ChrisB200SX wrote:
There’s a lot of very anti-bike helmet folk out there, who forth at the mouth at the idea of helmets. And make up all sorts of nonsense why they are pointless. They are on a par with anti-vaxxers in my view.
And yes complusory wearing and simply wearing helmets [or not] are two very diffrent things.
I personally wear one, but am dead against complusory wearing because of complex epidemiological reasons, it backfires from a safety point of view.
Incorrect.
Incorrect.
imajez wrote:
Have you got any evidence to back up this assertion of many very anti-bike-helmet folk and how they behave?
I don’t believe these people really exist and it’s just a straw man for helmet evangelists to have an argument with. The irony is that many of the helmet evangelists will try to paint your position as anti-bike helmet.
There are several people who
There are several people who post here who have very strongly held views on the efficacy or not of cycle helmets. (or have posted, e.g. ShutTheFrontDawes)
As people have said there are several helmet issues which might be debated but if you want a binary I’d suggest “no protection at all” or even “may make crashes worse” on the “anti” side and “you’re a complete idiot / should pay your own medical costs if you don’t wear one” on the other. (I’m not sure even Australian posters on here have declared “thou shalt” by legal compulsion but I stand to be corrected!)
imajez wrote:
— imajezHow are you with people opposed to helmet compulsion who quote facts, not made up nonsense? In the long history of the cycle helmet debate, only one side has made up nonsense, starting with the notorious Thompson, Rivara and Thompson paper of 1989: it’s carried on ever since.
Zero comparison with anti
Zero comparison with anti-vaxxers. Vaccines are overwhelmingly a huge public and individual/self-help benefit, with negligible risk. Helmets are at best of dubious benefit in any sort of crunch with a motor vehicle, and there’s a case to be made that they only raise the danger level.
Anti vaxxers have swallowed evil and nonsense conspiracy stuff, a lapse into the type of folklore that existed before mass education. But talk to me about no cars by 2030, 15 minute cities, though: where do I sign?? Those remain annoyingly elusive.
A V Lowe wrote:
I agree that both parties seem to be unaware of their converging paths. I agree on the importance of having some awareness of what’s going on behind you as a cyclist (though quite how you could ‘always’ be aware I don’t know).
But the driver did not, as you say, hold a steady position in the lane, and Dan did not move into the lane ahead of the driver. The driver changed lanes on the roundabout, and that’s where the conflict occurred. It’s unrealistic to suggest a lifesaver would have helped Dan much, particularly as at the time their paths converged, he had another vehicle inside him and so limited room for manouvre.
A V Lowe wrote:
It’s truly impressive that as you flew from your bicycle during the course of a high impact collision you were able to calculate the exact distance your head was away from the tarmac and ascertain that it was definitely less than the thickness of a bicycle helmet. Kudos, not many people could manage that.
Rendel Harris wrote:
I often doubt “I chose to…” stories of people’s awareness and degree of mental control in a short moment BUT some things you can (inadvertently) train for (so thought not required). I suspect if you did e.g. serious parachute training or regularly practiced falling safely – e.g. some martial arts or indeed rugby! – at the very least you’ll be relaxed in these situations and probably tuck up or fend off as appropriate. Being relaxed on its own may reduce injury as your body naturally crumples and absorbs energy more gradually.
EDIT also this sort of training can improve / maintain core strength which is also probably a win in lots of ways!
I don’t doubt that, as a
I don’t doubt that, as a former rugby player I certainly learnt a lot about how to protect myself in high-impact collisions. I have no doubt that the original poster saved themselves from harm by knowing how to fall, I wasn’t arguing with that, I was questioning their assertion that as they flew over the tarmac they were able to judge precisely that they were so close to it that had they been wearing a helmet the helmet would have made contact. This seems dubious to me.
A V Lowe wrote:
As someone who has actually spent many years teaching thousands of folk to land safely, what utter tosh! The reality is that folk when falling off a bike or simply falling, they go splatt and learn nothing about how to fall. It takes considered and frequently repeated good practice to learn how to fall safely. Something made harder because you also have to unlearn some reflexes that don’t actually help and can in fact cause injury. Unlearning is very hard for most folk to do. Even then once you have learnt these skills, you need to keep practicing them to keep them usefully functional. Unless you spent a very long time practicing these sometimes counterinuitive skills.
Also, because I learnt how to fall correctly, a helmet is not an issue at all when hitting the deck or rolling. And yes I have used my falling skills a fair bit when cycling, because as someone who also MTBs, coming off one’s bike is a not exactly unusual. I went tumbling off bike in the snow only a couple of weeks back. Plus there’s been weird mechanicals and greasy surfaces when on paved surfaces. These skills have saved me many a hospital visit.
Reseach by pathologists who are actual experts in trauma injuries and death, discovered that helmets would have prevented over a third of deaths casued by head injury in fatal incidents. That’s a hugely significant positive benefit.
So watch the video again and ponder on whether Dan Walker was actually aware of the impending collision by checking behind as he moved into the lane ahead of the car driver
A TfL investigation [not a survey] into actual cycling deaths concluded that a major part of the disparity in gender fatalities differences was down to males being more likely to go forwards at lights or even proceeding on red. This is because being crushed by left turning vehicles at lights is the major cause of bike deaths.
Walker was cycling in correct lane, the driver wasn’t and then carved up Walker up. Looking behind would have made zero difference because Walker could not alter what the impatient/incompetent driver was doing. That’ll often be the case. The person behind who hits the one is front is at fault anyway. Walker may well have looked behind, we simply cannot tell because of poor video quality. But again it doesn’t matter, because it would have made little or no difference.
The only question is, where’s
The only question is, where’s the evidence (so not case control studies) that shows helmets increase cyclists security? It doesn’t exist.
If by “security” you mean
If by “security” you mean “protection in the event of head impact” or the like, could you explain why you think they wouldn’t do so? How is something that can reduce the forces acting on the head not going to help at least some of the time?
**reproducible evidence**
**reproducible evidence**
The issue with most studies is using the same/similar methodologies results in significantly different results (i.e. the methodology doesn’t exclude other more relevent factors correctly).
And the lack of significant correlation between helmet usage and head injuries anywhere in the world (either comparing different countries or time periods)
qwerty360 wrote:
The issue here is firstly that correlation is not the same thing as causation.
Secondly efficacy of a helmet in event of an incident is completely separate discusion from likelihood of an incident in the first place. Particularly when safe cities to cycle means helmet use is very rare. This may mean more TBIs could correlate to higher helmet use, despite there being no causal link – the important link.
As it happens cycling injuries [including head injuries] have risen even in previously safe cycling areas due to rise of eBikes.
imajez wrote:
How much of that is actually due to the rise in popularity of eBikes and how much due to the rise in the use of illegal electric motorcycles? As discussed many times in these pages, they might look the same but they are very different things.
imajez wrote:
— imajezAFAIK, this evidence comes solely from the USA, where ebikes are allowed to go up to 30mph, so inevitable that inexperienced people who have only ridden an unpowered bicycle will have significantly more injury collisions. I haven’t seen anything similar from countries with a rather more sensible top speed.
Worth a look at some of the
Worth a look at some of the Dutch cycle figures? Veiligheid NL had an analysis a few years back (in Dutch). I believe when they say “electric bike” here they are NOT referring to a speed-pedelec (different category) or illegal bikes – but since I needed machine translation to read this doc I am not certain.
It seems that although in their follow-up study overall approximately the same number of victims rode an electric bicycle (36%) as a normal bicycle (35%) there was a skew – there was a significantly greater fraction of A&E visits by people in the 55+ year old category who road an electric bike.
They said that seven out of ten bicycle crashes were single-vehicle crashes. This share did not differ for electric bicycles and regular bicycles. … Two-thirds of emergency department visits after a cycling accident involved serious injuries (MAIS2+). Older cyclists (55 years or older) were almost twice as likely to be seriously injured after a cycling crash than cyclists aged 25-54. Looking at the bicycle type, there is a greater chance of serious injury in an accident involving an electric bicycle compared to cycling accidents involving a regular bicycle. However, corrected for age and gender, victims on an electric bicycle did not suffer serious injuries more often than on a regular bicycle, but on the contrary had a significantly lower chance of serious injury. This difference in probability after correction for age and gender may be due to the fact that older victims relatively more often ride electric bicycles and more often have more serious injuries.
* MAIS = Maximum Abbreviated Injury Scale I believe.
eburtthebike wrote:
I thought there was evidence from NL of e-bikes increasing injuries overall.
But the evidence from NL is basically that the elderly make regular use of e-bikes and have comorbidities that result in them occasionally collapsing. If you double/triple time spent on a bike (which e-bikes allow) you double/triple the chances of it happening while cycling (while also potentially reducing the risk of it happening on other modes of transport, i.e. while driving a car…)
And overall the cycling still improves lifespan + quality of life – i.e. for every elderly person collapsing while cycling and suffering serious injury in resulting collision, several don’t collapse at all because of improved health from regular low level exercise that e-bikes allow.
Not entirely sure what you
Not entirely sure what you mean by ‘cyclists security’ but if you mean protection, some pathologists [you know the actual experts on this sort of thing] did a study and determined that in fact a helmet could save your life in a very significant numbers of head injury fatalities. 37%
Interesting – but perhaps not
Firstly as Chris Boardman said in the UK we really don’t need to spend more time and energy on “but helmets” (for a start they are for “after the bad thing already happened”).
Study is interesting – but perhaps not surprising given what
they are designedwhat the standards rate them as offering protection for *.Helmets would not have helped cyclists in most high-energetic crashes, especially when motor-vehicles or trains were involved. Some rear-end crashes outside urban areas also resulted in injuries when a helmet would not have helped.
This study concludes that cyclists should wear helmets, but they should also be aware that it cannot protect them in particular situations. These facts should be incorporated into safety campaigns to prevent cyclists from feeling protected in such situations when helmets cannot help. Our results also support the building of cycling paths separate from traffic, particularly outside of urban areas.— study of 119 autopsy reports of Czech cyclists
All sounds sensible although the last comment about “outside urban areas” probably needs a deeper dig **.
It’s not a criticism of these kind of studies per se but most are not looking at overall population health so are not also considering the impact (if any) of PPE regulations on whether or how much people cycle. Having more people being more active (and fewer trips driven, so less pollutants from motor vehicles especially in denser urban areas) may outweigh any negatives of injury / death that might have been reduced / prevented by e.g. helmets.
Similar conclusions (from different analysis) in a Dutch road safety study here:
https://www.veiligheid.nl/kennisaanbod/cijferrapportage/fietsongevallen-en-snor-bromfietsongevallen-nederland
Note that while not the “big issue” in NL it is in countries like the UK (where effectively “nobody cycles”) the idea that people should be pushed to wear helmets is not a popular one in NL – for what that’s worth!
* Of course there’s nothing to stop you wearing a motorbike helmet or manufacturers offering a great helm version (that might interfere with vision though … and indeed breathing). And lots of them say “ah but our produce exceeds the standards” but of course then they’re basically reporting on themselves.
** Those are IIRC data does show you’re more likely to sustain a more serious or fatal injury in a collision. Probably largely to do with higher motor vehicle speeds / lorries and farm machinery / longer emergency response times. HOWEVER there will almost certainly be far more collisions within urban areas because many more cyclist – vehicle interactions. And “feeling of safety”, feeling you can have normal social interactions AND convenience is what seems to get “normal” people cycling trips. Few sit down to carefully read the statistics before choosing a transport mode…
Sigh! Missed the quite specific and singular point being made. Which is the research shows helmets will affect chances of injury and death if you do happen to have an accident and you are wearing or not wearing a helmet. It is not research on say wider epidemiological implications of compulsory wearing or how good bike infrastructure is or not.
It is a counter to the denialists who claim a helmet has zero use should you choose to wear one and have an accident. You know, the very specific point I was rebutting. Not to mention that most accidents do not, as it made out by the helmet denialists involve being run over by a 38 tonne lorry. Many in fact involve no other vehicle.
To save tedious nonsense attacks, I am in favour of safe segregated bike infrastructure, reducing car centric culture and hate the normalisation of road violence. I am also dead against compulsory helmet wearing/high viz and victim blaming. However I do choose to wear a helmet in case I do have an incident. Which has happened several times, where helmets have been damaged and myself, not at all. At the very least I would have needed stitches and in one case almost certainly concusion/cracked skull when my head was slammed with great force into concrete. Also useful in cases of road rage.
imajez wrote:
Good for keeping focussed. Also keen to avoid tedious nonsense – though I hope I mentioned that in my wider one?
Anyway, an interesting study as you say.
It seems likely* most cycle crashes are “single-cycle incidents” but (according to this UK 2020 summary – apologies, don’t have more recent data) NOT most cycle fatalities (there are some queries about how they’ve done those numbers IIRC e.g. what counts as being “involved” in the collision?). (Again this shouldn’t really be a surprise). Not had a chance to look at the Czech study you linked and I don’t know how comparable the road environments there are to the UK – I’d guess similar?
* The Dutch study I linked (sorry – need your own translation – but there’s an infographic version here that’s maybe clearer) did indeed show the clear majority of injuries / fatalities (63%) were single-cyclist “fell off bike” crashes. Which shouldn’t come as a surprise there (less interactions / much safer interactions / different demographics cycling e.g. more older / younger people).
I would expect there are more people in the UK involved in collisions with motor vehicles than in NL because our road environment is rather different. Again I suspect you’re right on the overall proportions though.
Sounds like a story there?
Trains!!?
Trains!!?
Well obviously you’d want a
Well obviously you’d want a train helmet for those… haven’t read it all yet but presumably they were being very thorough in checking what a cycle helmet might have protected against!
Ignoring that wearing a
Ignoring that wearing a helmet makes you more likely to be involved in a collision.
imajez wrote:
The paper DOESN’T state 37% of fatal head injuries would have been prevented.
It sets an upper bound of 37% for those where a helmet could have helped.
Basically it is very easy to go helmets won’t prevent death when the person died from multiple injuries, or the (significantly stronger than helmet) skull was crushed. It is very difficult to determine if helmets would have prevented fatality in more minor incidents.
qwerty360 wrote:
“37% cyclists from this study could have survived if they had been wearing helmets.”
That is an incredibly significant result.
Yes I wrote will when linked rather than could by mistake, so will amend. But that doesn’t alter the fact that helmet wearing will save lives if you are unfortunate to have an accident. Which counters the denialist nonsense from the anti-helmet folk.
imajez wrote:
“37% cyclists from this study could have survived if they had been wearing helmets.”
That is an incredibly significant result.
No it isn’t. There are a large number of these hospital based studies and they all suffer from the same methodological shortcomings and are contradicted by the much more reliable long term, whole population studies.
Yes I wrote will when linked rather than could by mistake, so will amend. But that doesn’t alter the fact that helmet wearing will save lives if you are unfortunate to have an accident. Which counters the denialist nonsense from the anti-helmet folk.
It’s hardly nonsense when those opposing you have much better evidence. The fact that you wrote “will” instead of “could” is evidence of your bias.
imajez wrote:
Whereas this study https://trl.co.uk/publications/ppr446, says that the figure is between 10-16%. It does admit, the final sentence, that population studies show no benefit, and that hospital studies show a much greater benefit, but have serious methodological shortcomings.
That study is an update of this one from nine years previously, which was roundly criticised for its estimation of 6% reduction in deaths, based on absolutely nothing, it was pure speculation https://trl.co.uk/uploads/trl/documents/PPR446_new.pdf and the fact that they included a paper from TRT which was outside the chosen dates. https://www.cyclehelmets.org/1230.html
The study you quote is likely to also have serious methodological problems, making it much less reliable than the long term, whole population studies. There are a large number of studies showing massive benefits from cycle helmet wearing, but they all suffer the same lack of reliability, whereas the whole population, long term studies are highly reliable.
imajez wrote:
Since apparently you like citing studies, I now await your links to studies analyzing autopsy reports of people having taken a shower, walked the stairs, climbed a ladder, or recieved a brick on their head.
marmotte27 wrote:
Not entirely sure what you mean by ‘cyclists security’ but if you mean protection, some pathologists [you know the actual experts on this sort of thing] did a study and determined that in fact a helmet could save your life in a very significant numbers of head injury fatalities. 37%
— marmotte27 Since apparently you like citing studies, I now await your links to studies analyzing autopsy reports of people having taken a shower, walked the stairs, climbed a ladder, or recieved a brick on their head.— imajezOr indeed, walking, which has the same death rate as cycling for distance travelled.
imajez wrote:
Marmotte could be a francophone rodent – like a fat, oversized burrowing squirrel. Their natural language lacks the precision of our own beautiful tongue, and the distinction between security and safety is one of the casualties, since either can be translated by their word sécurité.
(No subject)
Wow!
Wow!
There’s a lot of willy-waving going on.
People seem to have forgotten that Mr Walker was most likely using the roundabout due to the poorly maintained cycle track/underpass adjacent which is often glass strewn and results in near constant conflict with pedestrians due to being one of the only crossing points of the fast flowing inner ring road.
As an ex-resident of Nether Edge, one of the neighbourhoods in the local vicinity I’d be more inclined to aim my ire at Sheffield City Council and their woeful infrastructure provision than make ill informed opinions on the merits of wearing/not wearing a piece of polystyrene.
One can only assume Mr Walker suffers from delusions of grandeur for choosing to cycle across what is considered one of the two worst accident black spots in Sheffield. It’s an extremely quick roundabout built and honed to reduce restrictions for motorists and everyone else can “get fucked”.
Perhaps, in future Mr Walker won’t be so stupid in his personal choices, rather than deflecting his unsubstantiated opinions onto others.
Bloke comes across as a bit of a twat.
I’d like to see more of them:
I’d like to see more of them:
https://youtube.com/shorts/S-wPLBMqwdA?si=0Ohy3MAOl7WYUxlF
There’s nothing like bike
There’s nothing like bike helmets to generate some debate, so let me add my two penny’s worth……I’ve had 3 “proper” bike accidents in 40 or so years. First was 30 years ago when a car failed to give way and pulled out a left hand side road. Destroyed my bike, shattered my bike helmet… my main injury was concussion. What was then CTC did a great job of getting me compensation. 25 years later I came off at about 20 mph….no other vehicle involved….some impressive arm fractures, destroyed bike helmet, no concussion (perhaps the nature of the accident, perhaps better helmet technology) and the final one was on an MTB and entirely my fault (broken ribs, some damage to helmet).
My point being that plenty of accidents don’t involve another vehicle and even when they do, the main injury can still be a head injury.
Suspect none of my accidents would have been fatal without a helmet but head injuries would almost certainly have been worse without one.
No-one is obliged to wear one, but many of us do so for good reason. In the same way that we could all drive a car with cheap Chinese tyres with tread close to the legal limit but most of us choose a safer option.
Ronabike wrote:
And that’s exactly how it should be! And probably a better result (in terms of numbers of cyclists wearing helmets) than would be achieved by compulsion.
It’s true, I have had many
It’s true, I have had many falls and all were on my fault skidding (touch wood, etc). Never broken a helmet though, but on some may have touched ground. In any case despite the low speed, the concept that you will think fast enough to protect your head is BS, it is pure luck.
To be honest though, the Specialized helmet (the cheapest possible, not the superlight ones) I have now fits remarkably good on my head, other that I tried seemed like a brick. Maybe people haven’t found their right helmet.
I’ve had a few bike crashes
I’ve had a few bike crashes when racing my BMX. My last was last September when I broke a little finger. My head did indeed slam into the berm but as this was a BMX race, I was wearing a full face lid. I’ve had a few other crashes in my years of BMX racing and training before as well. A lid has certainly prevented more serious injury. And I’ve also had to call out an ambulance for a lad who had a big crash at my local BMX track. He wasn’t wearing even a skid lid at the time and I’m sure the severity of his impact would’ve been reduced if he’d had one.
But I rarely, if ever, wear a lid when I’m cycling on the road.