MOTORCYCLE SAFETY
These two videos are designed to teach drivers how to be more aware of motorcycles on the road, and to show motorcyclists how to protect themselves and drive more safety.
The University of Akron features a web site with lots of information about motorcycle safety. Visit them here.
The CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) also feature information on motorcycle safety. Click the image at right to visit their website.
A MUST READ for ALL Motorcycle Operators
Good Morning, fellow Clevelanders!!! My name is Tom Prebis, and I have an URGENT message, borne of my own near-death experiences, to deliver to my fellow North Coast Residents who utilize two wheeled forms of motorized transportation.
I do not drive again yet, a consequence of my wholeheartedly Bucking the statistics at every turn, and actually SURVIVING a catastrophic automobile accident back when I was but a sixteen year old kid. I was not speeding or behaving irresponsibly, mind you; I merely caught an ill-placed patch of black ice the right (or wrong) way, sending me headlong into a tree. After my wreck was discovered mere seconds after impact, through an Extremely Unlikely sequence of events, I was taken to Medina General Hospital, where the two Emergency Physicians whom I encountered on his night have since told me, TO MY FACE; that “Tom, when you first came in that night, No One thought you would live five minutes.” After riding LifeFlight to our Patently Astounding city hospital, MetroHealth Medical Center, as well as about three years of intense inpatient rehabilitation, I managed to eventually pull through. Keep in mind that this all transpired nearly ten years ago, in March of 2002.
The issue about which I am writing you today, however; is the Overwhelming Lack of helmet use among motorcycle riders which I have observed on the highways and byways of our fair city, and which, in my newfound (and temporary) position as a vehicle passenger, I am now much more inclined to notice.
As the unlikely survivor of a MASSIVE head injury myself, incurred in that wreck I told you of above, I would like to ask motorcycle riders: just Why is this so?
Do you not know of the astounding fragility of our brains? One could be forgiven for thinking, given the amount of abuse which the Human Body is capable of enduring, that our brains are similarly hardy. However, I feel compelled to inform motorcyclists that underneath the eggshell-thin protective shield of our skulls, our brains are UNBELIVABLY fragile organs, sensitive to the slightest of physical insults.
Whenever I see a motorcyclist riding without a helmet now, I just wish that I could convey to them somehow the game of Russian Roulette which such a Glaring Omission conscripts them into playing with their lives. Tell them of the LIVING HELL I went through after my own automobile accident, sustaining a relatively ‘Mild’ Traumatic Brain Injury, or TBI. This is a devastating injury which has now earned the Entirely Ignominious designation of “The Signature Injury of Modern Warfare” (a not-so-thinly-veiled reference to Iraq & Afghanistan).
Personally, when I first learned that it is legal in Ohio for people to ride motorcycles without a helmet; after establishing that I had NOT, in fact, been unknowingly transported to The Twilight Zone, my first thought was ‘don’t our lawmakers in Columbus value the lives of motorcycle riders?’...
Riders should be aware that, contrary to the Orwellian views of our Ohio Legislature, Helmets have a Proven Track Record of SAVING LIVES. You may hear of “your neighbors cousins girlfriend” (or some similarly distant connection) who actually survived a motorcycle accident because they were not wearing a helmet. However, prior to using such as a reason to forego wearing a helmet themselves, riders should know that a person has a better chance of winning the lottery than they do of being involved in an accident where this outcome might be the case. And would anyone possessing luck that Extraordinary Please Contact Me? You and I need to go on a vacation to Las Vegas together. Seriously, please look me up!!!!
