Ride safely everyone

Just want to say ride safe out there guys if your on the street. Here in pasco FL we lost 2 guys yesterday evening. 1 I didn't know and the other has rode with our group a few times. I didn't know him personally but god rest his soul. RIP Parrish.

Parrish was hit at 5:52 pm yesterday by 68 year old man on state rd 54. The man did not see him when turning on the highway. According to FHP Parrish attempted to avoid the crash but was unable hitting the car and ejecting from his bike. He passed at the scene of the accident. This is 4 deaths now in our county this year. ....... shame!

To some of you that argued when I stereo typed the elder shame on you. Here in FL that's how it goes. We get smoked by some people who don't even belong driving anymore.

The problem I have with all these deaths is that driving in the U.S. is a privilege not a right. Yet drivers don't see that, they see riding as the privilege only. Why is the riders test so ....... difficult compared to getting a drivers license? Why don't we test people every so often to make sure they can still ....... drive?

I've been in aviation for over 20 years, flown all over the world in all kinds of environments, I still have to take a check ride once a year to make sure I can fly(professionally), and would have to take a biannual to fly for fun. Not to mention I take flight physicals once a year.....after 50 they have to check your prostrate very year.....a real pain in the ......lol

My point is that it is unfortunately, "dead easy" to get a license to drive a car. Maybe we should dedicate some energy to fixing that.

Ride safe,

Thamer where do you think flight 370 could be?

Thamer said:

The problem I have with all these deaths is that driving in the U.S. is a privilege not a right. Yes drivers don't see that, they see riding as the privilege only. Why is the riders test so ....... difficult compared to getting a drivers license? Why don't we test people every so often to make sure they can still ....... drive?

I've been in aviation for over 20 years, flown all over the world in all kinds of environments, I still have to take a check ride once a year to make sure I can fly(professionally), and would have to take a biannual to fly for fun. Not to mention I take flight physicals once a year.....after 50 they have to check your prostrate very year.....a real pain in the ......lol

My point is that it is unfortunately, "dead easy" to get a license to drive a car. Maybe we should dedicate some energy to fixing that.

Ride safe,

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Short answer is that public transportation in America sucks. I lived in Germany for a while and of course it's much more difficult and expensive for Germans to get a license. The Germans that do drive are much better trained than your average American who was basically handed a license after a cheap & easy test. Big difference in that in a lot of places in Europe you can get around just fine with public transportation so they don't have to make the license test very easy and deal with a bunch of idiots on the road. Make the U.S. license test harder and you prevent a lot of people from being able to get to work (or anywhere) because for much of the country public trans isn't an option.

So what we have is a system that basically gives everyone a license then we attempt to put a band-aid on the problem by setting low-speed limits.

Eleven 99 said:

Short answer is that public transportation in America sucks...... Make the U.S. license test harder and you prevent a lot of people from being able to get to work (or anywhere) because for much of the country public trans isn't an option.

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It's a valid point. No one wants to pay for public transportation - even though auto travel is heavily subsidized by non-auto users.
Couple that along with zoning laws that encourage developmental sprawl making access to an automobile a requirement for all but the few metropolitan areas having a good public system and you get what exists now - older drivers, many of which shouldn't be driving, being forced to drive because they have no other choice.

If you want to remove older drivers from behind the steering wheel, then support development of alternate, highly developed, public transportation.

sunshinestate said:

To some of you that argued when I stereo typed the elder shame on you. Here in FL that's how it goes. We get smoked by some people who don't even belong driving anymore.

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While older drivers are a concern, making blanket statements about them is absurd.

And you can probably find more than a few people who would also include (in that category of "people who don't even belong driving anymore" ) anyone who admits that they've received 3 speeding tickets in the past year.

I think the point here may be stupidity kills.


Cagers fault

And us.


100+ at night in crowded places or places where pavement is bad, your stupid and looking for a darwin award.

Personally, I slow the F down in places where there is quite the "old" public traffic.


Because your Fn invisible. Luck is involved.

Prince Albert said:

Thamer where do you think flight 370 could be?

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Hi PA, you're looking lovely, as always!

I think of every one else on the road as idiots other than me, I do not trust any one around me so I take every precaution I can to make sure I am safe at all times.

mali said:

I think of every one else on the road as idiots other than me, I do not trust any one around me so I take every precaution I can to make sure I am safe at all times.

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This is very similar to a motto I ride by, and has helped others: Assume that no one else on the road can see you, and the ones that do, are trying to kill you.

I've always thought that it would be better if each licensed driver would be required to log a certain number of hours per year on a motorbike as I think that ones capacity for situational awareness increases once you learn to drive (and survive) in traffic on a motorbike. It's not a measure to limit drivers but to make better drivers.

(Tampa area) This past Friday I was riding home, hopped on 275 south to be greeted by an older GSXR, cruised with the dude down 275, on to I4 for a split second, off at 21st St, and through Ybor. Coming up to the 60 light the countdown clock for the light was low, I didn't care to hop lanes to make it through so the GSXR scoots around a few cars and through the light, I stop first at the light. Sit there for a few min, turns green, roll on. Coming up to the Crosstown overpass not a few hundred yards past the 60 light, I see traffic packed up 3 lanes wide. I pull up and stop, sit for a min and start to see numerous people get out of there cars. This is a pretty typical fender bender spot as people exiting off the Crosstown have to cross Causeway to get back to 60. There is a right turn lane onto the Crosstown which was open so I said screw it, I'm gonna go around, through the light which is green while everyone else is stopped there. In the far right straight lane is a gas tanker, I come up the turn lane barely crawling, pop out in front of it and here is this GSXR mangled to ...., not 10ft in front of the light. Had I not just seen the bike for the past 15min next to me no way I would have known what it was from the wreckage. No body around so my eyes start scanning, a good 100 yards past the bike, past a set of rail road tracks, dudes laid out. I'm already in the middle of the mess with no where to go so I roll through, not 10ft from this guy. Looks like he took the impact to his right shoulder, folded it over behind him with his right arm barely attached laying motionless in a pool of not good. Never have I had anything get to me like seeing this, I got home as quickly and safely as possible, and had to shed some tears for this guy. Sad .....

Regardless of whether he should have cut traffic or not doesn't matter, just a guy trying to get home on a Friday night. Had he just stopped he would have been in one piece still. I searched all weekend for info or an article on the accident but could find nothing. I assume from his condition he had passed right then and there.

OP you mentioned two deaths this past Friday, do you have any info on the 2nd you heard about, not the one off 54. Was it this guy?? =(

-Shawn-

Wow, A4, that is just plain f'd up. I had a long-time friend and rider witness something similar about 5 years ago, and he was first to the fallen rider. He was just a kid, something like 19 and he died in my buddy's arms. He packed it in after 30+ years riding and racing all kinds of 2 wheels, said he'd never get over that. RIP

Sad stuff guys. RIP to both of these souls.

Life is all about making as many good decisions as possible. As you all know, on a motorcycle, it is critical. Even if you do make all the right decisions on your bike, there is the element of luck that has the final say.

Play the odds. Give luck less of a say on the activity we all dream of, and put so much energy into.