How Being Hit by a Vehicle Changed Times Colleagues’ Lives (2014) | Hacker News Reader

How Being Hit by a Vehicle Changed Times Colleagues’ Lives (2014)

nytimes.com

50 pointsjseliger59 comments

I ride a motorcycle and was involved in a collision a few months ago and I can attest to one thing from the article:

"Your life will probably not be the same"

I wasn't injured as badly as the author was but flying through the air and breaking bones hurts. Thing is, I only changed my perspective because I was forced to. I'm much more patient on the bike, and more alert too. People everywhere drive while distracted (eating, makeup, the phone, their computer!, putting clothes on) and now I have to assume they will attempt to murder me. Most drivers don't have to go through that. They literally forget that driving is inherently extremely dangerous because they have ever improving cages around them. I would say that the vast majority of drivers are grossly negligent on the road.

Like other commenters mentioned, I've changed my language about vehicle collisions. I refuse to call them "accidents". Some may be, but "accident" implies that there's no fault. That nobody fucked up; but that's just not true in real life. People literally merge on top of me, while I'm __not__ lane-splitting at least 4-5 times a week. I consider almost any traffic death manslaughter, at least. If there's clear fault / distracted driving I consider it murder. It might be an extreme conclusion, but distracted driving is essentially saying "My trivial needs are more important than other motorists' lives." and it saddens me that our judicial system fails to adequately select for responsible driving.

When I move into an apartment I like to disable all the smoke detectors in the building and lock all the emergency exits. You know, I like to ride on the wild side, and I like to create the conditions for everyone else to be at risk of accidentally killing people.

I consider anyone who starts the fire guilty of at least manslaughter though, and if they were distracted when it happened it is definitely murder. They literally forget that fire is inherently extremely dangerous with all their ever improving safety gear. So I like to keep it real and make sure that we don’t have it.

Would you please not post like this?

I almost banned you, because https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15883519 and other past comments also broke the guidelines, but you've posted plenty of civil, substantive comments as well. Please stick to those only.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

You ain't kidding. Winter bicycle riding is an eye opener: it's crystal clear how almost every driver has that small glowing rectangle in their hand or lap as you go by.

I pity the motorcyclist commuters: all the same vulnerabilities as a pedal bike but without the growing safety focus (bike lanes, etc). I figure e-bikes will take over for those people soon enough.

I am somewhat skeptical about stop light cameras as a way to improve safety; however, I would be interested to know if we could automatically fine drivers who are caught on camera using their phones.

What about mechanical breakdowns? Some of those are down to negligent maintenance, but sometimes stuff just breaks. Wouldn't those be considered accidents? For instance, I've seen a tire come off of a truck before and go rolling across the road. Maybe it was negligent maintenance, maybe it wasn't. But I acknowledge that there is a possibility that stuff happens that is nobody's fault.

Yes I understand that. From my comment: > __Some may be__, but "accident" implies that there's no fault.

Those things do happen. For example, I recently saw a video where a big rig carrying cement crashed into a line of cars due to brake failure. But those are, I would guess, a small percentage of total collisions.

Mechanical breakdowns that cause an accident are extremely rare today. The technology in your breaks are amazing. If you can also still steer, you have everything you need.

In the future-present however, with computers running everything, I wouldn't be surprised if this changed < break systems getting "confused" and over-ridding user input.

This. Something like 6% of insurance claims (I forget where I read that). When you filter out all the ones without injury or property damage to anyone else's property it really isn't much at all.

Makes me think of a recent incident in Seattle where an aggressive driver in a large truck sped up and passed intentionally close to a bicyclist to intimidate them (incredibly, incredibly dangerous). This happens frequently enough as any cyclist can attest, but it was special because it was caught on camera and shared with the police. The cyclist tried to report it as attempted murder (and even the former mayor of Seattle described it as such), but the police department said, "This looks like an inconsiderate/unsafe pass. An officer would typically need to witness a violation in-progress to be able to stop the driver & confirm their ID to issue a citation." Nevermind that there was clear video of the whole thing.

About a month later a car hits and kills a cyclist and runs away. Who knows, maybe the driver was trying to do a non-prosecutable "inconsiderate/unsafe pass" that got a little too close.

https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2017/10/12/25468300/this-vi... https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/transportation/bic...

In Orange County, on average one person a week dies from getting hit as a cyclist. Knowing that, it's the true road warriors who risk riding on the main roads. I use the beach boardwalk which is pedestrian only and it goes 30 miles roundtrip. That's plenty.

What that driver did should be treated the same as pointing a gun at someone's head. It's a threat of death.

In 2003 a work colleague and I were crossing 5th ave in Seattle headed to lunch. While legally crossing, multiple cars ran the red light, collided with each other, then struck her. It was truly a miracle that she lived; frankly her being significantly overweight was likely the only reason she was saved. I was very lucky to jump back out of the way and avoided being struck.

That same year, there were two other car-pedestrian accidents at that same intersection with at least one involving the fatality of a German tourist.

When I was called by the Seattle Police Department as a witness to the accident, they did everything they could to tell me that we had been jaywalking, rather than recognizing that no, multiple cars had in fact been speeding trying to make it through the already red light. Fuck the police.

In reality, I'd say that my co-worker's life changed for the better. She lost a lot of weight, took up new activities, moved to the Bay Area, and had a new outlook.

For me, having seen all of it in moving detail, I guaranteed it resulted in undiagnosed PTSD.

Cars run red lights all over in downtown Seattle. Probably every other day I see a near-miss that if pedestrians were simply following their WALK sign and not being extra cautious they'd have gotten run down.

The most frustrating is when cars run red/yellow lights and then block the intersection so other traffic can't proceed on their greens. (Annoying when you see your bus coming but it can't get through an intersection because cars are blocking it). And the police don't care. There will literally be a police officer helping direct traffic out of a garage just feet away from vehicles that ran red lights and are now blocking intersections or trying to drive through a crosswalk as pedestrians are using it.

But boy are they eager to issue jaywalking tickets to pedestrians.

In 2005 I was in Seattle watching a couple with a small child receive a citation for jaywalking because they were still in the road after the red hand stopped blinking. While the officer was writing the citation I saw the lights change and three cars ran the red, then at the beginning of the next cycle a car jumped the green to make a left before oncoming traffic. The officer didn't even look up.

Almost got hit in downtown Mountain View of all places over the summer when a car ran a red and we had entered the crosswalk after the pedestrian signal turned to walk.

It's insane that a driver would try to run a red in an area teeming with pedestrians in the middle of the day.

When we were kids, my brother got chastised by the police for getting hit by a car while riding his bike 'dangerously' along the non-stopping direction at a 2-way stop.

It's a pretty good way to impress upon a kid that the police are operating on some other end than simply enforcing the law.

While cyclists have the right to use the road and I don't want to see anyone hurt, I don't understand the apparent lack of sense of self-preservation it takes to cycle on a busy road. Bottom line, if a cyclist becomes entangled with a 4,000+ pound vehicle, it doesn't matter who's at fault: the cyclist loses.

I myself only cycle on low-traffic streets or dedicated bike paths.

Am grandparent poster. I also ride and race road bicycles and that means on busy public roads, too. We are aware of the bottom line, as you say. Cyclists will lose a fight with a car or even a motorcycle and there's no two ways about it.

But, while I dunno about other people, I'm not going to let risk prevent me from living my life. I'm going to ride my bike, consequences be damned! However, I probably have what most people consider an unhealthy tolerance for risk, so I'm not a particularly good person to sample.

That used to be me, however, if you go fast enough with a bike, those low-traffic streets (likely more turns/intersections) or bike paths slow you down considerably. There is a happy medium (big enough road either with separated or minimal traffic), but not always available.

Honestly, I simply can't wait for AI to dominate driving and remove increasingly distracted humans from the loop.

This is why when I need to enter a lane of traffic on my bike, I make sure I'm right in the middle of it. I'd rather stay to one side so cars (or other two-wheeled commuters) don't have to fully change lanes to get around me, but I've had plenty of experiences like the one in the video and I've decided that it's better to be safe than sorry.

Agreed. Having been run over by a large truck while biking to work changed plenty of things for me. Aside from being the living example of the 'bus factor' on my team, convalescing was a huge change in the way I normally do things, not being able to bike, climb, play with my son, or even just tidy up was initially maddening, but ultimately valuable. Also knowing that the social contract is real, that first responders were there in five minutes to get me out from under the truck and to the hospital, surgeons managed to bolt most of me back together, and people from all walks of life were willing to help hold doors and so on for someone in a wheelchair. I'm back on the bike now, and I do feel much, much more conscious of how little it would take for someone driving distractedly again to take me out for good.

Glad to hear you've recovered and you're still riding. I agree. Every time I get on the bike I think to myself "someone could kill me this time". It definitely makes me more appreciative of my life and also more cognizant of my mortality.

It is a bit extreme but I completely agree. If you're driving a car that has the capability to easily maim and kill (sometimes without even noticing!) then one must take responsibility for that power.

It boggles the mind that someone would be willing to trade the life of a stranger to send a text message.

I was in a serious car accident when I was a young man -- both legs broken and, more severe, a shattered L3 vertebra -- and this rings true for me. It's a difficult feeling to relate, fully, but what basically happened afterward is that this previously abstract notion of a "car accident" irrevocably crystallized into something that actually can and does happen and so riding in a car with other people for whom this possibility remains abstract is now almost unbearable.

Sorry that befell you. Hope it hasn't unduly impacted your life. Indeed the possibility doesn't even occur to most people. It's gotten so bad that I will literally get out of a car if the driver picks up his or her phone.

My rules for riding a motorcycle:

1. Everyone is trying to kill you.

2. Anyone who isn't actively trying to kill you cannot see you.

3. The day you forgo a piece of gear is the day you need it.

So far a year of lane splitting in San Francisco and I'm collision-free.

Yeahhh I go by that, too. Except I only learned that post-collision.

In the US, cars kill more people than opiods, more people than guns. If you're under 35, your highest chance of dying is in a car crash. After 35, it's heart attacks and diabetes; in other words, severe lack of exercise because we drive everywhere. It's truly the silent health epidemic of our time.

Of course, you won't see improvement any time soon. Every bike lane or safe street initiative is met with "But my parking!" Every fatal accident due to driver intoxication, negligence, or road rage is dismissed by judges and juries alike because "That's just how it is".

The answer is not to surrender the comfort and convenience of cars for the utter misery of being exposed to the HARSHNESS of the elements on longer commutes; it's to fight comfort and convenience with MORE comfort and convenience!

Staying at home, working via VR telepresence, eating liquid soylent pumped directly to the home like water and gas.

Skipping over what I'm pretty sure is sarcasm, never leaving your house isn't a really great long term strategy. Unfortunately, what I believe to be the ideal solution: denser living, better public transit (high freq. w/ bus lanes would be cheap and effective), and pedestrian-first streets (sidewalk/bike area = car area); is simply a non-starter for most of the US. Outside of coastal cities, most Americans can't even imagine what that's like without immediately jumping to visions of Manhattan urban canyons (not even Queens). And even then, as this article points, Manhattan is not some oasis of car-free lifestyle either.

> Every fatal accident due to driver intoxication, negligence, or road rage is dismissed by judges and juries alike

Do you honestly believe there's even a shred of truth to this?

Vehicle accidents where people get hurt typically result in pretty severe punishment if there's even a hint of some performance impairing drug (e.g. alcohol) or malicious intent involved.

Yes the automobile industry through their sock-puppet MADD have very effectively divided "bad" dangerous drivers (impaired by intoxication) from "good" dangerous drivers (impaired by literally anything else). The only way a pedestrian death gets prosecuted is if prosecutors can prove the driver and not the pedestrian was drunk. Without intoxication, the only way such a death gets prosecuted is if the pedestrian comes from a politically-connected family. Even with driver intoxication, "victim was on a bike" is often completely extenuating.

I'm most familiar with the Northeast... The Globe did a study of DUI cases and found greater than 85% of them were dismissed. All of the recent high profile bike fatalities in the Boston area resulted in no arrests, let alone penalties, despite the driver being at fault.

An SUV rolled over and killed 4 pedestrians on the sidewalk in the Back Bay. No arrests because the police couldn't determine which person in the vehicle was driving.

The case that will forever be burned into my head is Allison Lau in Queens. A 3yo in a crosswalk with her grandmother. The driver ran right over them, killing her. He lied to the police, saying the girl ran into the street and there was nothing he could do. Dashcam from another vehicle later showed he was on his phone when he was turning left. After public outcry, he was finally issued a $50 failure to yield ticket that was later dismissed.

I know it isn't directly about cycling, but this story reminds me of the parody article I saw in The Onion: "Study: 90% Of Bike Accidents Preventable By Buying Car Like A Normal Person" [1].

I commute 30 miles each day on an electric bike, and while I haven't been hit yet statistically it's only a matter of time. I wish we had the infrastructure in place to make cycling a safe alternative, but it'll take years of build out to get to that point.

One thing I will say is that San Francisco drivers are actually pretty courteous towards cyclists, even when I have to take up a whole lane (happens whenever there's on-street parking and no bike lane). It feels like about half of the people who swear at me/flip me off for "impeding traffic" have out-of-state license plates.

[1]: https://www.theonion.com/study-90-of-bike-accidents-preventa...

That's a lot! What's your setup like?

Top Gear did an episode where they made a bunch of PSAs just like that:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aK_Ru6tScBE

Interesting. It's dangerous to be a journo in the big city.

The newspaper should change its style guide to prohibit the use of the word "accident" to describe car crashes, except in verified quotations. They should call them "crashes" or another word that doesn't connote inevitability.

That would be weird because 1) what they are literally describing is the plain definition of 'accident'; 2) 'Accident' doesn't really connote inevitability.

The Oxford dictionary almost disagrees, I think you could argue the point. Note the origin too.

“by accident Unintentionally; by chance...

...Origin

Late Middle English (in the general sense ‘an event’): via Old French from Latin accident- ‘happening’, from the verb accidere, from ad- ‘towards, to’ + cadere ‘to fall’.

It's worth disagreeing about - calling them 'accidents' removes responsibility from the drivers involved, think about phrases in English like "accidents happen" - which are used specifically for this purpose. Calling them 'crashes' is simply a description of what happened, without any suggestion of why.

I'm ambivalent about that.

It's one of those words whose meaning has changed in a context. Like trying to take back the word senile to mean "old age".

Generally people take accident to mean a "collision", whether intentional or not. Negligent or not.

Perhaps, but I think it's good when major publications use what influence they have to favor precise, accurate language over ambiguous euphemisms.

I took a precision driving training class a couple of years ago. The instructor, a retired state trooper, said that many first responder departments have begun referring to them as "crashes" for the very reason that you mentioned.

I thought this as well, and was about to comment to the paper about updating their terminology. Then I saw this is an article from 2014. I think using the word “accident” would be less likely today. There has been a real effort to change terminology. NYT even had an article about this in May of 2016.

A friend from my early years was just hit and died from a car. Crossing the street at night.

He was a musician and "the one to potentially make it" so it extra stings for everyone who knew him.

I'm more alert as I walk my neighborhood daily. A bit more cautious. Cars and other drivers simply do not care about you as much as you care for yourself.

I was hit by a van a few weeks ago. I was on my bike, waiting to cross a busy street, the van was next to waiting to turn right and the driver was looking to his left to see when traffic stopped. Unfortunately he started moving before he turned to see what was in front of him. I was knocked off of my bike (I wasn't moving when I was struck) and my bike ended up getting run over & destroyed

It was a pretty surreal experience. At first I flipped out at the driver who was at work at the time. A woman called 911 and the police came to take statements. The driver was pretty apologetic afterwards and I apologized for being an asshole. It wasn't until a few hours later that I realized that I could have died pretty easily. He put his foot on the brake reasonably quickly after he hit me, but had he accidentally floored the van, I would have been run over too.

I also felt pretty bad for the driver. He probably got in some kind of trouble at work, and I realized that while I was mostly unharmed and only needed to get my bike replaced, he could lose his job. I know that getting hit is pretty serious, and the reason was because of the same carless behavior a lot of people that drive seem to do (myself included).

We make driving far too easy. Narrower lanes, trees right next to the roads, and more potholes would probably go a long way toward making driving safer, both for the drivers and for everyone else. Because at the end of the day, drivers subconsciously adjust their behavior to achieve an apparently-constant risk level as roads and cars improve.

Or there's always the spike-in-the-steering-column theory. https://jalopnik.com/theres-actually-a-name-for-a-steering-w...

I'm going to guess a lot of these accidents are during a turn right on a red or an unprotected left turn? In a very crowded city they are very difficult to make with constant pedestrian traffic. And then my own experience in Berkeley and SF is that pedestrians tend to be impatient and cross on a red at all the minor intersections. One of the reasons I just avoid driving in such crowded places.

Wow. That's a good guess because that's pretty much what happened to me. Someone hit me turning right while I was in a crosswalk. Because drivers are so car centric, all she did was check that there were no cars coming from her left and immediately started her right turn even though I was in the crossroad already. She had a yield, which she failed to do. (They later made that an actual stop sign. Probably because too many pedestrians were getting hit?)

Know what the craziest part of the experience? The car wasn't even moving that fast but because cars had so much mass there was an enormous transfer of energy that resulted in a "bumper fracture" for me and pushed me so hard that my foot ripped through the top sole of my running shoes.

I've largely recovered but I've never been able to run as fast I used to. Up until day I was breaking various personal best times in running and had actually finished third in my age group in a local 10km race earlier that year. That was the peak of my running ability and it's been a struggle to get back to it ever since.

Unless the law has changed since I got my California license, pedestrians have the right of way at all crosswalks regardless of what the lights say. Also, every intersection has crosswalks at it, even if they haven't been painted on the street.

And unless its changed since I got mine, a car may not enter a crosswalk that has a pedestrian in it. Not often enforced, but I think its there to make it always the car's fault?

Varies by jurisdiction. Requiring traffic in both directions to stop once a crossing pedestrian has left the lane and then aggressively enforcing it with fines is a great way to get the law changed.

It varies. In a marked crosswalk I think you're generally correct, however if a pedestrian just jumps out to cross the road in front of a car it's likely going to be the pedestrian's fault. At some point pedestrians have to be a little bit responsible and respectful of the gross difference in mass between their bodies and even a small car.

I grew up outside of California, so "right of way" is a foreign concept for me.

I look both ways (and over my shoulder for any turning cars) to make sure the traffic is actively slowing down before I set foot onto the asphalt. You can't always trust the other person (or computer) to yield.

There's an orange "don't walk unless safe hand" at a crosswalk and a red light where a right can be taken when safe.

Until there are no conflicting signals there are going to be problems because both parties use the same criteria (no cross traffic) to determine when it's safe to go.

Right-on-red is illegal in New York City, except at intersections where it's specifically marked as allowed (which are rare, and usually have turn lights or other features to make it safer). Unprotected left turn, though, yeah.

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