Shocking footage released by police shows driver crashing into cyclist, catapulting her into the air (+ video)

I wondered if the blue car was actually going any slower than the cyclist, so I overlaid the video. This shows the blue car is travelling at a very similar speed to the cyclist, yet nobody is calling out the driver of the blue car for travelling too quickly past the scene of a collision...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9J7_4MGqEBI

Nice work! Amazing how many online commentators were insisting that Alan's video was just cycling propaganda.

pdw wrote:

This sentence seems bizarrely harsh, given what normally gets handed out for mowing down cyclists with far more aggravating factors.  

Perhaps it just seems bizarrely harsh because the sentences normally handed out are bizarrely lenient. I do agree there may have been more to it than meets the eye though, the guilty plea seems to imply it. It would be interesting to see the judge's sentencing remarks, which don't seem available anywhere.

Maybe you'd prefer the 6 fixed penalty points and £240 fine that the dude who knocked me off my bike got?
After all, I only broke 11 ribs, left ulna, dislocated left elbow, a TBI, 3 fractured vertebrae, punctured lung, internal bleeding, and a kneecap that what smashed in to four pieces.
I mean ... 6 points seems like a fair trade when the person you hit can't walk or use their arm for 4 months and is off full time work for 18 months.
£240 fine seems quite *reasonable* when the person you hit is left with permanent brain damage, limited mobility and increased risk of early onset dementia.

Or maybe I've read your post wrong ... ?

There is no doubt in my mind that sentences for motoring offences against cyclists have been far too lenient in the past. I hope that what @pdw was trying to say is that this sentence is a move in the right direction and I personally hope it continues along the same path. As others have pointed out we rarely get to hear the whole story behind these trials and sentences but on the face of it this is good news.

I read it as nothing more than an observation on the fact that someone can be caught high, banned and a reapeat offender and still not end up in jail after hitting a cyclist. I don't think they were suggesting it was correctly lenient. 

The sentence is not harsh but on the face of it relative to other tripe sentences that get handed out it seems unproportionate.  We are only seing a 48s clip however, and I suspect the judge was weighing up bigger factor.  Im no leagle eagle but I think the fact it was a Crown Court means it has went beyond the Magistrates level.

pdw wrote:

This sentence seems bizarrely harsh, given what normally gets handed out for mowing down cyclists with far more aggravating factors.  Were there other factors not mentioned in the story?

The offence of Causing Serious Injury By Careless Driving is fairly new (came in June 2022). If this incident had taken place before then, the offender could only have been charged with Driving Without Due Care and Attention and the most you can get for that is a fine and driving ban.

some twunt of a Torygraph reader wrote:

“She actually hit him. Admittedly he crossed a junction probably without looking well enough, but she seemed to be the one speeding and not looking.”

So they missed the bit about how the person already on the main road and going straight having priority? Some people...

They can't have priority though, they're a cyclist. As they're clearly *going much slower than cars* it's sensible that they should always give way to drivers. Anyway the driver had clearly timed it correctly to clear the junction if the cyclist hadn't been *going too fast*...

My take - either straight up didn't look, or only looked for cars, or saw a cyclist and assumed they were going slowly or would just get out of the driver's way. Sadly all produce the same outcome.

brooksby wrote:

some twunt of a Torygraph reader wrote:

“She actually hit him. Admittedly he crossed a junction probably without looking well enough, but she seemed to be the one speeding and not looking.”

So they missed the bit about how the person already on the main road and going straight having priority? Some people...

It's amazing how these people change their opinions of roadcraft based on the type of vehicle, or at least have dual standards. If you replace a bike with a bus and replay the scenario, they would completely change their opinion of the driver - "that idiot just drove in front of a bus without looking".

This driver was speeding and is at fault for driving into the car from the left.

https://youtu.be/0LXzm_8RWRQ?t=541

I hope you don't pay to read that tripe !

I hope you don't pay to read that tripe !

Fair's fair! He's doing it so we don't have to!

“I think the car in front of him almost certainly obstructs his view of the cyclist.”

I have posted three images below of a pull out near miss, in which I was temporarily in a driver's blind spot. The reason I posted the images was that after looking at the video and extrapolating lines of sight I thiink it may be possible that a similar situation occured in this case. 

It works both ways of course, the cyclist could not see the car and had no chance of avoiding the collision.

The motorist performed a manoeuvre when he could not see that it was safe to do so. I agree with Rendel's double thinking, the sentance is appropriate... But would the outcome have been different if the driver was represented by Mr Loophole?

No as there would not be any technicalities involved such as "I didn't receive the nip in 14 days", "I needed a shit", "I'm famous and famous people never do anything wrong"

The comments on these articles tells you everything about the everyday fuckwit that inhabits our roads. The sort that thinks that if you can't safely do something then you should just do it anyway because obviously its not your fault if you cause an accident. The sort that thinks cars behaviour around cyclists shouldn't be held to a higher standard than when they are around other cars despite the danger being 100x more. 

Yes. Exactly why these punishments are important.

Hopefully some of these morons realise you 'not paying attention' isn't an excuse for driving over someone.

I think it was like image 2 by cycloid - basically didn't look

I feel like I have had this quite a few times with drivers pulling across me and nearly hitting me. Well, I say nearly hitting me but it was exactly like this video. I nearly went into the side of them at a rate of knots. 

A textbook pull out - no excuse

Fortunately it was fairly slow motion and a collision was avoided,

Here's the bit in between 

As the oncoming car passes I am in the driver's blind spot. So maybe he did look, but did not look properly. It's no excuse, but may help to explain what happened. My road reading skills were not up to anticipating that situation on the day, but my reactions compensated!