Imagine a beautiful summer morning!
Roads are empty, birds are singing, sun is shining – a perfect morning for a ride!
But beware - there is a killer on the road!
As you probably figured out from the video title – I’m not talking about a guy from
the Doors song!
I’m talking about the sun!
Believe it or not – if you ride a motorcycle or drive a car – it can kill you in few
several ways.
Let’s watch some videos in which the sun caused an accident, and then discuss how we
can avoid such thing happen to us!
Let’s go!
Let’s watch the first clip!
Now let’s analyze this crash.
Here we have low and bright sun which obviously blinds the rider.
But that’s not the only problem.
If we look down at the pavement, we can see that it is wet.
When the road surface is wet it also reflects the sun straight into our eyes, so we can’t
really shield from it.
Usually if we just simply have a sun glare – we can tilt a helmet forward a bit to
hide our eyes from sun glare.
But here we can see that it is not an option.
In this situation we have to ride really slow and careful.
Here our rider goes through roundabout and accelerates right away, probably because it
is a familiar road and usually traffic here goes pretty fast.
But obviously, not this time!
So, if you find yourself in such situation, with blinding sun glare, and especially if
the road is wet – don’t just assume the road ahead is clear, even if it usually is.
Slow down, and make sure you are not accelerating into some guy’s rear fender!
Now let’s see the next clip.
From this video we can see that we have to consider that sun blinds not only us, but
all the other people on the road, including people behind us.
For us bikers it is even bigger problem, because our vehicles are pretty narrow and it is more
difficult to see the motorcycle in the sun glare than a car.
That’s why if you find yourself in the situation like this, when you have a chance to be rear
ended – know that with low bright sun this chance significantly increases.
Don’t be too close to a vehicle in front of you, leave yourself some space to make
an escape.
Also, it’s a good idea to point your bike a bit to a side of your lane, so you can make
your escape easier.
And obviously when you stop behind a car like in this situation – pay attention to your
mirrors, be in first gear and ready to go until you absolutely sure that everyone behind
you stops.
You can never be too careful with this damned cagers!
They’re there to get you!
Now let’s see a bit more complicated case.
At first glance this is a classical left-turner accident, the type which we already covered
pretty good in one of our previous videos.
The rider goes forward on the intersection and this stupid cager doesn’t see him.
But let’s not jump to the conclusions.
Notice this shadow, specifically its length and direction.
It means the sun is sitting pretty low and it is right behind the biker.
When the sun is directly in front of you – it makes you blind, and when it’s directly
behind you – it makes you invisible.
So, this guy in the car may even pay attention, but he still can fail to see the oncoming
bike.
Again, remember that the bike is pretty narrow and it’s very hard to see it against the
sun.
That means that if we have the sun directly behind us, we have to consider it, because
oncoming traffic pretty much can’t see us.
We have to go slower and be ready to take evasive action!
And in these kind of situations on intersections with possible left-turners, which are pretty
dangerous already we have to be even more careful.
Long story short – be aware of the sun glare not only in front of you, but behind you too,
know you are very hard to be seen adjust your speed accordingly and be ready to brake.
And now let’s watch one more clip.
It’s a car accident, but it applies pretty good to motorcycle riders as well.
When you are riding against the sun – pay extra attention to pedestrian crossings.
Pedestrians are extremely difficult to see against the sun glare.
To make matters worse – remember, that a lot of pedestrians are not riders or drivers,
and they do not realize that you can’t see them against the sun glare.
So again, if you are riding through an area in which there can be pedestrians – go slower
and pay extra attention to the road situation.
Ok, enough for today, if you want to see more about road strategy – click this video.
And if you find these videos useful and want more people to see them – please like and
subscribe!
As always thank you for watching, and hope to see you soon!
Bye!