Jen,

My 21 year old grandson just had a motorcycle wreck and broke his leg.  He had surgery 4 times thus far trying to make things right.  They can be dangerous.  I think you mentioned that about your dad once before to me.  That’s quite sad.


[log in to unmask]



> On Apr 8, 2017, at 11:06 AM, Jenifer Barr <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> 
> Phil, that's horrible.  Sorry, not sure what else to say.  I hate
> motor cycles.  My father was killed on one.  A car swerved into his
> lane right in front of him just so he could pull into his driveway.
> My dad tried to drop the bike and jump out of the way but the guy was
> coming to fast.
> Jen
> 
> 
> On 4/7/17, Phil Scovell <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> This happened over a year ago.  I just put the finishing touches on it and
>> decided to send it out.
>> 
>> 
>> I was checking the light switch in the dining room on my way to bed, Sunday
>> night,  It was about 11:30 PM.  I heard a loud crunch and then something
>> that sounded like metal being dragged on the pavement in front of our house.
>> I soon heard the gunning of an engine and I figured someone had dropped
>> their muffler and was dragging it down the road and trying to pull over.
>> Our son leaves a hundred feet behind us and he was still up and heard it,
>> too.  We live about 100 feet from the street and it is a very busy
>> north/south 4-lane road that is heavily traveled.  We have had many wrecks
>> of cars and trucks during the 32 years we have lived in this house.
>> 
>> Once, a runaway driverless van came rolling down the hill from the gas
>> station a 150 feet to the south of our front door.  The driver had been
>> working on his engine with it running when the van slipped into gear, ran
>> over him, dragging him 50 or 60 feet, and then, leaving in an empty field
>> next-door to us, crashed into our concrete front porch.  It fortunately
>> rammed the porch on the corner with the thickest amount of concrete sticking
>> up, about 18 inches, which kept the whole van from running up on to the
>> porch and right into our picture window.  My youngest grandson, about 6
>> years old at the time, and I were walking together passed the window when
>> the van hit.  One wheel rose up on our porch and knocked down a iron support
>> post designed to hold up that corner of the overhanging roof.  It felt like
>> an earthquake and the boom it made sound like a jet breaking the sound
>> barrier.  The first to arrive on the scene was a firetruck with paramedics
>> to tend to the injured man laying in the field next door to our property.
>> The van engine was still running when the police arrive in about a dozen
>> police cars.  An ambulance loaded the unconscious man aboard and took him to
>> the hospital.  Fortunately, we sustained no damage to the house and the
>> firemen, using a sludge hammer, pounded our support post back into place.
>> And to think I almost bolted the iron support into the concrete once.  The
>> roof would have caved in on that corner of the overhang if I had done so.
>> There is more to that story but you have heard enough to realize that we
>> live on a busy street and have witnessed many wrecks and crashes, as well as
>> other things, such as shootings, and the like.  So Sunday night was no
>> different overall.
>> 
>> Our son told us the rest of the story Monday during a cookout at our
>> daughter’s house.  Two motorcycle gang members were riding their bikes at a
>> high rate of speed and coming north toward our house.  About 200 to 250 feet
>> to the south of our front door is the corner of an intersection.  There is a
>> stoplight there but it is a manual light.  That means, when my kids went to
>> school across the street years ago, they would push a button and the light
>> would change to red and stop all the traffic.  If there are no pedestrians,
>> the button is not pressed, so the traffic sees green all the time unless
>> someone is trying to cross the street.  Anyhow, I got carried away but I am
>> trying to explain what it is like living on a busy street.  Back to the
>> story.
>> 
>> The two motorcycles came roaring at a high rate of speed going north but you
>> could easily hear their racing engines more than a block away.  A Car was
>> just turning east at the intersection.  Why the bikes did not slow down is a
>> mystery but the didn’t.  They possibly could not slow quick enough do to
>> their high rate of speed.  The tail end of the car was still partly in the
>> intersection when the lead motorcycle rammed the back of the car and slid
>> by; crunching the bumper and trunk of the car.  The biker had a girl wearing
>> just a helmet, for protection,, on the back of the bike.  In other words,
>> she  was not wearing any leather jacket or pants or leather protective
>> gloves in case of a crash.  The motorcycle laid down and slid for 100 feet,
>> the girl falling off the back  but the driver trapped under the bike.  Such
>> enhanced motorcycles can weigh anywhere from 500 to 750 pounds.  My sons
>> Honda 1000, for example, weighs 650 pounds and a Honda Gold Wing weighs 750.
>> These gang style bikes, or club motorcycles, are often stripped bikes, and
>> built up engines but they still weigh several hundred pounds.  The crashed
>> motorcycle, with its driver, slid from the intersection, clear to our
>> mailbox at on the edge of the street which is on the north corner of my
>> property line.  He was killed instantly.  Our son saw  the other biker  as
>> he rode back and forth and taking pictures of his dead friend.  I don’t know
>> if this was being done for legal purposes or not but they later tried
>> blaming the driver of the car who was just turning the corner.  For a bike
>> to slide 200 feet, you can’t be doing the 35 to 40 mile per hour speed limit
>> on that street.  My son estimates they were doing 90 Miles Per Hour when
>> they crashed.  The biker who was killed lay in the street and my son said
>> his helmet face plate was crushed down into his face.  Everett also said the
>> biker may have tried driving out of the fall, that is, speeding up to try
>> and center the bike but it was already tilted too far over to recover.  The
>> girl was still alive when they put her into the ambulance .  He thinks she
>> may have fallen off the back of the motorcycle closer to the crash so she
>> wasn’t dragged as far as the bike driver.  Soon, the gas station was filled
>> with dozens of bikers watching the traffic police working the scene.
>> 
>> Monday night, the biker gang return to the scene for several hours.  They
>> rode their bikes up and down the street, about 100 of them stood around at
>> the gas station next door.  Others rode their bikes to the spot where the
>> guy had lain in the street, stopped, revved their engines to an ear
>> splitting pitch, and then did a burn out.  This is when the engines are run
>> to a high revolution and the breaks set so the bike cannot move.  The
>> breaks are then release and the back wheel spins, burning rubber off the
>> tire until the tire finally catches.  Then the bike burns away at high
>> speed.  Other times several pulled up to our mailbox where their buddy had
>> died and just cranked their engine to high speed over and over again.  Some
>> people got off their bikes and blocked traffic.  We were one of those.
>> Coming home from our daughters cookout, we got into the middle of the
>> traffic jam in front of our house.  Our son said  some of the people were
>> holding lighted candles.  As I said, the bikers were slowing and blocking
>> traffic by dismounting their bikes and walking in front of cars that had to
>> stop while others just parked and sat crossways on their bikes; all to let
>> people know they were mourning the death of one of their own.  I lost my
>> ability to smell years ago but Sandy said the smell of burning rubber almost
>> made her sick.  They conducted their burn outs less than 100 feet from our
>> front door and they still do burn outs in that same spot to this day when
>> driving back, day or night, more than a year later.