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Is Every Biker Doomed to Eventually Crash?

By Rocky Thompson on May 11th, 2009

Maybe I’m naïve, but I don’t think crashes that result in hospital-trip injuries are an unavoidable part of cycling. Sure, everyone’s going to have an embarrassing scrape where they can’t get their foot out of a pedal at the top of the hill or they mistime a jump onto a curb and end up face-down on the ground, but riding your bike every day doesn’t mean that you’re guaranteed to spend a day every year in the emergency room.

Eco Velo posted a list of activities and fatalities per million hours. Cycling comes pretty low on the list, but you also have to consider that most people spend significantly more time cycling than say, Scuba diving or Skydiving (or any kind of diving, for that matter).

Activity                         Fatalities Per Million Hours

  • Skydiving                                 128.71
  • General Aviation                       15.58
  • On-road Motorcycling               8.80
  • Scuba Diving                            1.98
  • Living (all causes of death)        1.53
  • Swimming                                 1.07
  • Snowmobiling                           .88
  • Automobile Driving                   .47
  • Water Skiing                             .28
  • Bicycling                           .26
  • Flying (domestic airlines)           .15
  • Hunting                                     .08

The response to the information was, to me, more interesting than the chart:

- It is very likely that you will get hurt several times this year while riding your bike.

- I expect to be run over, just not today.

And this gem:

- Skydiving is so dangerous! I hope they work out the kinks soon because it seems like such an efficient way to get around.

What’d you think? Is being a committed cyclist guaranteeing trips to the ER?

via Bicycle Blog [Eco Velo]

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This entry was posted on Monday, May 11th, 2009 at 10:23 am and is filed under Current Events, Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

6 Responses to “Is Every Biker Doomed to Eventually Crash?”

  1. jeff b May 11th, 2009 at 11:21 am

    “Life is either a daring Adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure.” ~Helen Keller

  2. Marit May 11th, 2009 at 3:08 pm

    Yes.

  3. chris May 11th, 2009 at 3:45 pm

    According to the data, both “automobile driving” and “living (all causes of death)” have higher fatality rates than bicycling. So unless you spend far more hours bicycling than driving or living, cycling would actually be safer than either of those two activities, which most people spend far more time doing rather than bicycling… So you’re safer on the bike! Who woulda thought!?!?

  4. David May 11th, 2009 at 3:49 pm

    Let’s see … 1,000,000 hours equates to 114 years, assuming you are riding your bike 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. For a modest 8 hours per day, 365 days a year this becomes 342 years. So if I bike 8 hours a day and live to the ripe old age of 342, then I have ~25% chance of dying in an accident while biking – I can live with that :-). On a more realistic note, if I bike on average 2 hours a day, bike for 70 years, then I have something like a 1% chance of a fatality while biking.

  5. Grogs May 11th, 2009 at 7:15 pm

    Good looks dave, but you forgot leap years :)
    maybe we should all just buy a shotgun and live in the woods.

  6. Jeff May 12th, 2009 at 4:20 am

    “Life is either a daring Adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure.” ~Helen Keller

    – that whole blind thing prolly did help with security