OB_defectron
Registered
just got this from a friend, it gave me a little thinking..
> What is a "reasonably foreseeable" impact? Any impact around 14 miles per
> hour or greater. Motorcycle helmets are tested by being dropped on an
> anvil from a height of six feet, the equivalent of a 13.66-mph impact. If
> you ride at speeds less than 14 mph and are involved only in accidents
> involving stationary objects, you're golden. A typical motorcycle
> accident, however, would be a biker traveling at, say, 30 mph, and being
> struck by a car making a left turn at, maybe, 15 mph. That's an effective
> cumulative impact of 45 mph. Assume the biker is helmet-clad, and that he
> is struck directly on the head. The helmet reduces the blow to an impact
> of 31.34 mph. Still enough to kill him. The collisions that helmets
> cushion effectively-say, 7-mph motorcycles with 7-mph cars-are not only
> rare but eminently avoidable.
> Another reason helmets don't work: An object breaks at its weakest point.
> Some helmet advocates argue that while helmets may not reduce the overall
> death rate, they prevent death due to head trauma. Jonathan Goldstein, a
> professor of economics at Bowdoin College, in Brunswick, Maine, wondered
> how this could be. If fatal head traumas were decreasing, then some other
> kind of fatal injury must be rising to make up the difference. Applying
> his expertise in econometrics to those aforementioned CDC statistics,
> Goldstein discovered what was happening. In helmet-law states, there
> exists a reciprocal relationship between death due to head trauma and
> death due to neck injury. That is, a four-pound helmet might save the
> head, but the force is then transferred to the neck. Goldstein found that
> helmets begin to increase one's chances of a fatal neck injury at speeds
> exceeding 13-mph, about the same impact at which helmets can no longer
> soak up kinetic energy. For this reason, Dr. Charles Campbell, a Chicago
> heart surgeon who performs more than 300 operations per year and rides his
> dark-violet, chopped Harley Softail to work at Michael Reese Hospital,
> refuses to wear a helmet. "Your head may be saved," says Dr. Campbell,
> "but your neck will be broken."
> John G.U. Adams, of University College, London, cites another reason not
> to wear a helmet. He found that helmet-wearing can lead to excessive
> risk-taking due to the unrealistic sense of invulnerability that a
> motorcyclist feels when he dons a helmet. False confidence and cheap
> horsepower are a lethal combination. I called a local (Massachusetts)
> Suzuki dealer, and told the salesman I was a first-time buyer looking for
> something cheaper than the standard $15,000 Harley. He said I could buy
> the GSXR 1300 for only $10,500, a bike that could hit speeds in excess of
> 160 miles per hour. He recommended that I wear a helmet, even in
> non-helmet-law states. Imagine: a novice on a 160-mph bike wearing a
> plastic hat that will reduce any impact by 14 mph. It's like having sex
> with King Kong, but bringing a condom for safety's sake.
> Why the enthusiasm for helmets? Mike Osborn, chairman of the political
> action committee of California ABATE, says insurance companies are big
> supporters of helmet laws, citing the "public burden" argument. That is,
> reckless bikers sans helmets are raising everyone's car insurance rates by
> running headlong into plate-glass windows and the like, sustaining
> expensive head injuries.
> Actually, it's true that bikers indirectly jack up the rates of car
> drivers, but not for the reason you might think. Car drivers plow over
> bikers at an alarming rate. According to the Second International Congress
> on Automobile Safety, the car driver is at fault in more than 70%of all
> car/motorcycle collisions. A typical accident occurs when a motorist
> illegally makes a left turn into the path of an oncoming motorcycle,
> turning the biker into an unwitting hood ornament. In such cases, juries
> tend to award substantial damages to the injured biker. Car insurance
> premiums go up.
> Osborn sees a hidden agenda. "They [the insurance companies] want to get
> us off the road." Fewer bikes means fewer claims against car drivers.
> Helmet laws do accomplish that goal, as evidenced by falling motorcycle
> registrations in helmet-law states. It is interesting to note that
> carriers of motorcycle insurance do not complain about their clients.
> Motorcycle liability insurance remains cheap. Osborn pays only $125 per
> year for property damage and personal injury liability because motorcycles
> cause little damage to others.
> Keith R. Ball was one of the pioneers of ABATE, its first manager in 1971
> and later its national director. What annoys him most is the anecdotal
> approach taken by journalists who have a penchant for reporting whenever
> the victim of a fatal motorcycle accident was not wearing a helmet. When
> was the last time you saw a news item mentioning that a dead biker was
> wearing a helmet?
> Which is not to say that Ball opposes helmets. He thinks anyone who rides
> in a car should wear one. After all, he points out, head injuries make up
> only 20% of serious injuries to motorcyclists, but they account for 90% of
> all car injuries. If Ball's idea catches hold, one day I suspect you'll
> see angry men stepping out of Volvos with odd T-shirts beneath their tweed
> jackets. The T-shirts will read: Helmet Laws Suck.
> What is a "reasonably foreseeable" impact? Any impact around 14 miles per
> hour or greater. Motorcycle helmets are tested by being dropped on an
> anvil from a height of six feet, the equivalent of a 13.66-mph impact. If
> you ride at speeds less than 14 mph and are involved only in accidents
> involving stationary objects, you're golden. A typical motorcycle
> accident, however, would be a biker traveling at, say, 30 mph, and being
> struck by a car making a left turn at, maybe, 15 mph. That's an effective
> cumulative impact of 45 mph. Assume the biker is helmet-clad, and that he
> is struck directly on the head. The helmet reduces the blow to an impact
> of 31.34 mph. Still enough to kill him. The collisions that helmets
> cushion effectively-say, 7-mph motorcycles with 7-mph cars-are not only
> rare but eminently avoidable.
> Another reason helmets don't work: An object breaks at its weakest point.
> Some helmet advocates argue that while helmets may not reduce the overall
> death rate, they prevent death due to head trauma. Jonathan Goldstein, a
> professor of economics at Bowdoin College, in Brunswick, Maine, wondered
> how this could be. If fatal head traumas were decreasing, then some other
> kind of fatal injury must be rising to make up the difference. Applying
> his expertise in econometrics to those aforementioned CDC statistics,
> Goldstein discovered what was happening. In helmet-law states, there
> exists a reciprocal relationship between death due to head trauma and
> death due to neck injury. That is, a four-pound helmet might save the
> head, but the force is then transferred to the neck. Goldstein found that
> helmets begin to increase one's chances of a fatal neck injury at speeds
> exceeding 13-mph, about the same impact at which helmets can no longer
> soak up kinetic energy. For this reason, Dr. Charles Campbell, a Chicago
> heart surgeon who performs more than 300 operations per year and rides his
> dark-violet, chopped Harley Softail to work at Michael Reese Hospital,
> refuses to wear a helmet. "Your head may be saved," says Dr. Campbell,
> "but your neck will be broken."
> John G.U. Adams, of University College, London, cites another reason not
> to wear a helmet. He found that helmet-wearing can lead to excessive
> risk-taking due to the unrealistic sense of invulnerability that a
> motorcyclist feels when he dons a helmet. False confidence and cheap
> horsepower are a lethal combination. I called a local (Massachusetts)
> Suzuki dealer, and told the salesman I was a first-time buyer looking for
> something cheaper than the standard $15,000 Harley. He said I could buy
> the GSXR 1300 for only $10,500, a bike that could hit speeds in excess of
> 160 miles per hour. He recommended that I wear a helmet, even in
> non-helmet-law states. Imagine: a novice on a 160-mph bike wearing a
> plastic hat that will reduce any impact by 14 mph. It's like having sex
> with King Kong, but bringing a condom for safety's sake.
> Why the enthusiasm for helmets? Mike Osborn, chairman of the political
> action committee of California ABATE, says insurance companies are big
> supporters of helmet laws, citing the "public burden" argument. That is,
> reckless bikers sans helmets are raising everyone's car insurance rates by
> running headlong into plate-glass windows and the like, sustaining
> expensive head injuries.
> Actually, it's true that bikers indirectly jack up the rates of car
> drivers, but not for the reason you might think. Car drivers plow over
> bikers at an alarming rate. According to the Second International Congress
> on Automobile Safety, the car driver is at fault in more than 70%of all
> car/motorcycle collisions. A typical accident occurs when a motorist
> illegally makes a left turn into the path of an oncoming motorcycle,
> turning the biker into an unwitting hood ornament. In such cases, juries
> tend to award substantial damages to the injured biker. Car insurance
> premiums go up.
> Osborn sees a hidden agenda. "They [the insurance companies] want to get
> us off the road." Fewer bikes means fewer claims against car drivers.
> Helmet laws do accomplish that goal, as evidenced by falling motorcycle
> registrations in helmet-law states. It is interesting to note that
> carriers of motorcycle insurance do not complain about their clients.
> Motorcycle liability insurance remains cheap. Osborn pays only $125 per
> year for property damage and personal injury liability because motorcycles
> cause little damage to others.
> Keith R. Ball was one of the pioneers of ABATE, its first manager in 1971
> and later its national director. What annoys him most is the anecdotal
> approach taken by journalists who have a penchant for reporting whenever
> the victim of a fatal motorcycle accident was not wearing a helmet. When
> was the last time you saw a news item mentioning that a dead biker was
> wearing a helmet?
> Which is not to say that Ball opposes helmets. He thinks anyone who rides
> in a car should wear one. After all, he points out, head injuries make up
> only 20% of serious injuries to motorcyclists, but they account for 90% of
> all car injuries. If Ball's idea catches hold, one day I suspect you'll
> see angry men stepping out of Volvos with odd T-shirts beneath their tweed
> jackets. The T-shirts will read: Helmet Laws Suck.
