It has been argued by many that motorcycles are inherently unsafe. This seems intuitively true, but I can say confidently that I am far safer on a motorcycle than in a car.
A car provides a good deal of protection in case of an accident. For a car accident to be fatal, it generally has to be quite severe. But I maintain that, in getting this safety, one is giving up the keen awareness of one's surroundings that a motorcycle provides. I have come closer to wrecking in my car more times than I care to remember, simply because I was distanced, psychologically, from the motoring environment.
On a motorcycle, however, I am always cognizant of my surroundings. Since riding a motorcycle is a much more immediate, visceral sort of experience, it is more difficult for one's mind to wander while controlling the vehicle than while driving a car. Because of this, motorcycles provide a much greater ability to avoid an accident, compared with one's ability to survive an accident.
Of course, especially in the case of motorcycles, the ability to avoid an accident is dependent on one's skill; since I have (as of this writeup) 10 years of off-road and on-road riding experience, this may be more an issue for the beginning rider. A class such as the Motorcycle Safety Foundation's Beginning Rider Course can help greatly. I'd been riding for five years when I took this course; controlling the bike wasn't the issue for me. Learning how to safely navigate in traffic, using the techniques they teach you has kept the rubber side down for me on several occasions.
One last point worth making, for charitably-minded people, is that in a motorcycle accident, you are much less likely to hurt someone else. If a car collides with a motorcycle, the motorcycle always loses. So if you're scared to death of hurting someone else, a motorcycle has something to recommend it.
A car provides a good deal of protection in case of an accident. For a car accident to be fatal, it generally has to be quite severe. But I maintain that, in getting this safety, one is giving up the keen awareness of one's surroundings that a motorcycle provides. I have come closer to wrecking in my car more times than I care to remember, simply because I was distanced, psychologically, from the motoring environment.
On a motorcycle, however, I am always cognizant of my surroundings. Since riding a motorcycle is a much more immediate, visceral sort of experience, it is more difficult for one's mind to wander while controlling the vehicle than while driving a car. Because of this, motorcycles provide a much greater ability to avoid an accident, compared with one's ability to survive an accident.
Of course, especially in the case of motorcycles, the ability to avoid an accident is dependent on one's skill; since I have (as of this writeup) 10 years of off-road and on-road riding experience, this may be more an issue for the beginning rider. A class such as the Motorcycle Safety Foundation's Beginning Rider Course can help greatly. I'd been riding for five years when I took this course; controlling the bike wasn't the issue for me. Learning how to safely navigate in traffic, using the techniques they teach you has kept the rubber side down for me on several occasions.
One last point worth making, for charitably-minded people, is that in a motorcycle accident, you are much less likely to hurt someone else. If a car collides with a motorcycle, the motorcycle always loses. So if you're scared to death of hurting someone else, a motorcycle has something to recommend it.
Source: www.everything2.com
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