“virtually indistinguishable” in the dark

[meic]

In that video he seems to have quite a large area of reflective material, and his rear light is bright. But even if his batteries were down, his front light was providing a bright pool of light moving in front of him (he wouldn't have been able to ride without it).

If they suppose the cause of his death was invisibility, then no cyclist is safe in Australia.

Mike's light was dynamo powered. "For the Indy Pac, I have a Grandfondo Ti V3 with conventional road calliper brakes from TRP and I’m rolling on Reynolds Aero 65 wheels. The front is built around the newly revised SP PD 8x dynamo hub."
https://road.cc/content/tech-news/21903 ... wheel-race

That only explicitly says that he had a front dynamo light.
It is quite common to run a front dynamo light and a rear battery light. I think that more of my Audaxing mates do this than having both lights dynamo powered.
Right or wrong we believe it makes the headlight brighter.

[Phil Fouracre]

I'm afraid that I find the attitude to cycling in Australia seriously frightening and depressing, compared to them, this country is bliss!
Ever since reading the story of the police officer who actually ran over a cyclist to stop him getting away, because he wasn't wearing a helmet!! I've just given up trying to figure out the mentality!

[Wanlock Dod]

Amongst all of the reports of the various drivers who were not really looking where they were going and reported him to have appeared out of nowhere, one Australian paper did manage to note that there were at least two motorists driving down the road that morning who were looking where they were going.

Jennifer Perrin spotted Hall on her way to work in Canberra, saying while it was odd to see a cyclist on that stretch of the highway in the dark, he was wearing reflective strips.
Anthony Maxwell also passed Hall that morning.
He noticed the bicycle had a bright rear red light and a forward facing white light.
Mr Maxwell told the court he noticed reflective material on his legs, disagreeing that it could have been light shining off the cyclist's calves.

[bovlomov]

Ever since reading the story of the police officer who actually ran over a cyclist to stop him getting away, because he wasn't wearing a helmet!!

That'll teach him!

[Steady rider]

A mistake by the driver may have occurred due to using dipped head-lights. If other vehicles were approaching changing to dipped was needed but only a junction is mentioned, correct me if incorrect.

Travelling at 60 mph needs the full beam to give time to react. The seeing distance on low beam is quite a bit less than on full beam.

[Cyril Haearn]

Ever since reading the story of the police officer who actually ran over a cyclist to stop him getting away, because he wasn't wearing a helmet!!

That'll teach him!

I read that someone was caught without a h*****t, the cops let her tyres down
Not sure if they searched her for a hidden pump

Has anyone anything good to say about Down Under? Especially anyone who has been there

[pwa]

A mistake by the driver may have occurred due to using dipped head-lights. If other vehicles were approaching changing to dipped was needed but only a junction is mentioned, correct me if incorrect.

Travelling at 60 mph needs the full beam to give time to react. The seeing distance on low beam is quite a bit less than on full beam.

Yebbut you don't need any beam at all to see a functioning rear bike light.

[The utility cyclist]

I'm sure someone must have posted this at the time, but it's worth seeing anyway.

Australian cyclist deaths surge and road safety strategy 'failing'

Over the past 12 months, 580 drivers were killed, which is up 1.8% from the previous year. Passenger deaths also increased over the same period by 3.8% to 219, pedestrian deaths increased by 4.7% to 177, while motorcyclist deaths decreased 21%. Cyclist deaths jumped by the largest proportion from 25 to 45 over the same period – an increase of 80%.

Given that 9% of Australian drivers admit to steering with their knees, it's good that cyclists have the protection of mandatory hats.

Ah but that doyen of all things plastic Jake Olivier has found that there's a decrease in motorised vehicular involvement in cycling deaths in Aus (And NL) so he and his cohorts are suggesting that on the one hand a country with a big increase in over 65s cycling has a few more non motorvehicle involved cycling deaths (IMHO down to e-bike uptake), on the other, a country with no increase in cycling and a rigid helmet law is seeing more deaths by plastic hat wearers. It'd be hilarious in so fact it highlights the very problem he has tried to deny occurs (risk compensation) except his study and others still distort the facts by cherry picking to prove their points about cycling safety.

[The utility cyclist]

In that video he seems to have quite a large area of reflective material, and his rear light is bright. But even if his batteries were down, his front light was providing a bright pool of light moving in front of him (he wouldn't have been able to ride without it).

If they suppose the cause of his death was invisibility, then no cyclist is safe in Australia.

Mike's light was dynamo powered. "For the Indy Pac, I have a Grandfondo Ti V3 with conventional road calliper brakes from TRP and I’m rolling on Reynolds Aero 65 wheels. The front is built around the newly revised SP PD 8x dynamo hub."
https://road.cc/content/tech-news/21903 ... wheel-race

That only explicitly says that he had a front dynamo light.
It is quite common to run a front dynamo light and a rear battery light. I think that more of my Audaxing mates do this than having both lights dynamo powered.
Right or wrong we believe it makes the headlight brighter.

The Australian police specifically ran the rear light only with a 6 volt battery in place of the dynamo for their testing of his rear light, this is public information.

[Brucey]

if fact the 'spill' above the cutoff in a dipped beam is bright enough that it will show up good retroreflectives from a considerable distance (else most road signs would be useless). Also the dipped beam pattern has a slant to it so that anything on the left verge gets high brightness illumination at a far greater distance than in the middle of the road.

cheers

[Steady rider]

https://www.lrc.rpi.edu/programs/transp ... rkshop.pdf

The driver was probably distracted by the parked truck and this may have partially blocked his view. My guess is a full on view when approaching the cyclist did not occur and the low beam was unhelpful, similar with the overall dark clothing. The full evidence would be needed to take more than a guess.

[bovlomov]

Didn't the police say that he was cycling by the verge? The original page has been updated, and I can't exactly remember.

[Steady rider]

One point that may be relevant is the trip from Cooma to Canberra, 116km or 72 miles. People sometimes drive 70 miles to work in Au but usually they crack on. If he did not even know it was a cyclist, then the attention to the road was probably below par. I think something like 7% (from memory) of fatalities are due to rear end collisions.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?sourcei ... sts+in+nsw
For night riding, I think light colours are better but research seems to vary.

[Adnepos]

...Earlier this year I acquired a rather nice dark blue jersey: it's now relegated to underwear status, ditto the plain black one some misguided wellwisher gave me recently. From now on I'm wearing bright clothing on top.

Black is a great colour - for funerals.

I do not believe that lights and reflective clothing/reflectors on frame and pedals at night and fluoro by day makes a big difference to safety. From what I understand, the evidence confirms that these options for cyclists increase conspicuity. But I haven't found evidence to show that conspicuity from these options translates to a decrease in collisions.

Anecdote: I was out on my cycle yesterday in broad daylight on an urban road yesterday. I was decked out in fluoro. A driver who must have seen me but didn't register that I was in the space he wanted to occupy pulled out from a side road, crossed the lane empty of traffic approching me, and did his best to run me amidships -I had to take significant avoiding action.

Maybe this sad case is yet another example of being seen but not recognised.

Anyway, I shall continue to make myself conspicuous even though I do not believe these options make much of a difference.

[thirdcrank]

Amongst all of the reports of the various drivers who were not really looking where they were going and reported him to have appeared out of nowhere, one Australian paper did manage to note that there were at least two motorists driving down the road that morning who were looking where they were going.

Jennifer Perrin spotted Hall on her way to work in Canberra, saying while it was odd to see a cyclist on that stretch of the highway in the dark, he was wearing reflective strips.
Anthony Maxwell also passed Hall that morning.
He noticed the bicycle had a bright rear red light and a forward facing white light.
Mr Maxwell told the court he noticed reflective material on his legs, disagreeing that it could have been light shining off the cyclist's calves.

My reading of that article is that the witnesses were 4 to 2. The evidence of each should be considered individually by the inquest, of course, but from the other side of the World, I don't think it's possible to dismiss witnesses because their evidence doesn't meet our expectations. I know nothing of the Australian legal system but I presume that its roots are similar to ours with a heavy burden of proof on the prosecution. In England, I think four independent defence witnesses saying that the deceased was hard to see would sink a prosecution.

Incidentally, my argument for wearing hi-viz has always been to reduce the scope for this sort of allegation if something goes wrong. It seems not to have worked in this case.