DataDan,
Do you think that the data for fatal crashes is representative of serious motorcycle crashes in general? I ask because a crash that results in paralysis is as much of a concern as one that ends in death. Do you think people injure themselves in the same ways they kill themselves?
That's a very good question, and I don't have a definitive answer.
I report on fatal crashes because detailed data is available that isn't available for non-fatals, and because they are of the greatest concern for many readers. From reading about crashes in the news and on forums for many years, my hunch is that fatal crashes generally occur in the same way as non-fatals.
To a large extent, the difference in injury severity is luck. Lowside in a right-hander with no other traffic around and you slide to the left shoulder, bruised up for sure but maybe not even in need of an ambulance. If there's an oncoming vehicle though, the consequence could easily be fatal. But then I read about a headon in Marin County in 2005 where the rider flew over the car (I think it was a Miata) and landed uninjured on a soft patch of grass. Hit a left-turner crossing your path near the front wheel and you'll tumble over the hood. Hit it at the "B" pillar and you could suffer fatal injuries.
There's some enlightenment on this quesion in CHP's
SWITRS reports, which cover both fatal and non-fatal crashes (US DOT's reports estimate rather than count non-fatal crashes). Here is a comparison of crash factors in fatal and non-fatal motorcycle crashes where the rider was at fault for all of California in 2008 (from Tables 7K and 7L):
[TABLE="head"]
Primary Collision Factor |
fatal |
% |
non-fatal |
%
Unsafe Speed |150 |39.8% |3,143 |47.2%
DUI |96 |25.5% |604 |9.1%
Improper Turning |54 |14.3% |1,386 |20.8%
Wrong Side Of Road |37 |9.8% |334 |5.0%
Other Hazardous Violation |9 |2.4% |129 |1.9%
Traffic Signals And Signs |9 |2.4% |125 |1.9%
Automobile Right-Of-Way |7 |1.9% |200 |3.0%
Unsafe Lane Change |7 |1.9% |182 |2.7%
Improper Passing |4 |1.1% |225 |3.4%
Following Too Closely |1 |0.3% |138 |2.1%
Unknown |1 |0.3% |67 |1.0%
Pedestrian Right-Of-Way |1 |0.3% |8 |0.1%
Other Equipment |1 |0.3% |6 |0.1%
Other Improper Driving | |0.0% |58 |0.9%
Unsafe Starting Or Backing | |0.0% |50 |0.8%
Brakes | |0.0% |1 |0.0%
TOTAL |377 | |6656 | [/TABLE]
The 377 fatal crashes where the rider was at fault comprise 70% of all fatal crashes while the 6656 non-fatals are 58% of the total.
I'm not real confident of this compilation because "unsafe speed" is a catch-all. With the US DOT data I used for the analysis of crash causes earlier in this thread, it can usually be determined, for example, that the motorcycle ran wide in a curve and hit another vehicle or fixed object. But in this SWITRS summary, the same crash could be categorized simply as "unsafe speed".