Olympic star Rebecca Romero supports HGV blind spot campaign

Perhaps I can add one key detail relating to self preservation - it is certainly worth pressing drivers to use the kit they now have to have fitted and working by law, but the ultimate safety measure is eye contact - see the driver and be sure they are seeing you. If that ain't happening get well out of their way. The driver who killed Elidh probably couldn't have seen her even looking in a safety mirror because his eyesight was defective, another driver was 'drunk' and using his phone. in other cases the cyclists have been unaware of the truck rolling in to that danger zone (ie looking for traffic coming up behind) until it was too late to take action which would either got them out of the way or make certain the truck driver driver had clearly noticed them AND acknowledged that fact.

The 5000 cyclist survey of Oxford and Cambridge riders focussed on looking - looking back, as perhaps the biggest factor in creating a cyclist - driver conflict. I do this very positively with bus drivers when a bus comes up behind me in town, and that non-verbal communication can deliver positive action, perhaps you will pull slight/y to the right and let the bus pull in to a bus stop rather than forcing the driver to slow right down or, make an ill-judged move to overtake and then cut-you up. Notably many of the 5000 cyclists surveyed, said that they were not confident to do the move described in motorcyclist training as 'The Lifesaver' a direct (not a mirror) look back over your shoulder - recommended for drivers too, as when merging lanes on a fast road, you may well discover that even a car has a 'blind spot' for vehicles directly alongside. The Oxford survey, also highighted that female cyclists reported rearward observation to be an area of weakness, which was matched by the bias in reported incidents where the cyclist came into conflict with a following vehicle. We do not have a clear picture of why this pattern emerged in the substantial survey but we do have the disparity of female cyclists as the vast majority of victims under the wheels on HGV's yet they are the minority percentage by gender, of cyclists using the city streets. This does suggest that there is more than mass of mirrors required, and a hope that all drivers are using them, to halt this roll of tragedy.

Eye contact should be the ONLY contact that connects a cyclist with the driver of any larger and heavier vehicle, and I have to commend the contractor for Shell's tanker fleet (Sucklings) - look on the back of every tanker trailer and there is both a clear indication of the wide left turn hazard AND a little cartoon picture of a driver's eyes looking back through the exterior mirror - if you are in front clock the driver through the windscreen, and when either of you is making that overtaking move make sure you are being watched in those mirrors. (I'll send a picture link to Road CC)

The other neat pictorial impact comes from the TfL picture of 20 cyclists doing a disappearing trick which would do Paul Daniels proud, simply by putting themselves at the vanishing point. (I wonder if he might do something as a safety campaign about making your bike, car or motorcycle 'vanish')