Riding a bike is as dangerous as fighting a war

A new book on risk (cannot remember the name of the top of my head)by well respected risk analysts pointed out that statistically spending a day riding a motorcycle (400 miles)is a little more dangerous then spending a day fighting in Afghanistan.

Obviously we all have different risk profiles but that was quote sobering to me at least having 2 small kids.

I ride daily but would still describe my skills as only average. I have had my share of close calls but I thought it was just my personal experience.

I won't stop riding but it is a scary idea for sure.

Btw the book is called the Norm Chronicles and it estimated the risk of a days riding at around 60 micronorts compared to a day fighting in Afganistan at 45 micronorts. This basically means you have 60 chances in a million of dying on a bike a day and 45 chances in a million of dying in a day in Afghanistan.

Alcohol plays a BIG role in the statistic of motorcycle injuries/fatalities. You can significantly reduce your risk by avoiding alcohol before riding. You can also wear good gear, not ride above your skill level, etc.

Soldiers in A-stan don't have any easy way to dramatically reduce their risks.

I broke my foot on my MC last summer and the VA doctor who did surgery said they have more amputees from MC accidents than from combat.:eek1

Seems like I remember a stat from the First Gulf War...

The 82nd troopers were safer in the combat zone than in garrison.

More troopers died in alcohol related motor vehicle accidents than in combat related activities.

NFE

Way to mow down the masses. I do not believe that all riders can be lumped together.

Riding while impaired, excessive speed, tired, angry and not knowing how to control the bike accounts for fully 90% of "accidents" while riding.

Don't be "That guy" and your 60 micronorts are now only 6.

Like others have said there are ways to reduce your risk, and moreso on the bike than in the Army. And there must (for example) certainly be a big difference in danger and death rates for someone who stays on base vs someone who has to do foot patrols.

Can you tell us more about the book? I assume it's using aggregate statistics along the lines of (registered MC's)/(MC fatalities) vs (deployed in Afghanistan)/(KIA in Afghanistan).

Link to the book... looks like a neat read:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Norm-Chro...id=1372259118&sr=8-1&keywords=norm+chronicles

Speaking of risk assessment, I always love needling the helicopter moms in my office: "You're afraid of a random predator abducting your kid, but you're not terrified of that child murderer in your backyard you call your swimming pool?"

If that scares you, maybe you should stay at home. No.....wait......

For that to be meaningful, you need to know how many total hours of motorcycling were carried out, compared to total hours of active combat. You also need to consider Paebr's point that some squaddie in combat is already almost certainly wearing the armour/boots they can. A lot of motorcyclists who have serious foot/lower leg injuries (which incidentally, are the most common injury in most forms of motorcycling) would have been better off had they been wearing proper/better boots.

Daveinva: If you really want to mess with them, you can point out that not letting the kids out of their neighbourhood, for fear of them being abducted by some child molester is statistically-speaking, practically handing them over to a paedophile. The overwhelming majority of cases involve a family member or someone who lives within the next few houses.

It's one of the weird things about risk, even when presented with concrete evidence to the contrary, otherwise rationale people have an extremely hard time debasing their "gut instinct" enough to do what is statistically safest.

Hmmmmm. I just took a flip through the book. A couple of things....

First, IMHO, this is a) questionable anthropology and b) mediocre science. There's a way to approach these types of questions with respect to populations (actuarialists attempt this all the time), but this doesn't seem to be the way. That, or the presentation is just poor. Any actuarial scientists feel like commenting? I'd love to hear the input. This book just seems to be a sensational look at numbers with little consideration of the actual variables that make the populations and their environments unique.

Also, I'm a deputy medical examiner. Just out of curiosity I did a little casual case review of motorcycle deaths in the county and a neighboring county in the last few years. The bottom line is, don't drink and ride. Just don't. There is an interesting series of studies by University of Notre Dame that is paraphrased here:

HTML:

http://oade.nd.edu/educate-yourself-alcohol/your-body-and-alcohol/

that has some good information about absorption rates and muscular response to ethanol. Fast-forwarding to the nudity, your eyes, hands and ears begin to go first, quite early, which affects your hearing and equilibrium just a little bit early on. Sketchy.

I guess he looks at death rates for both activities and does a pretty simple comparison.

To be honest I think that the stats make sense. I used to be a volunteer fireman and I came across several motorcyclists who had fatal crashes. I really didn't see that many dead by other means. It was the predominant mode of death around my area. No idea how many were drunk

Way too many factors to say how truly dangerous riding a motorcycle is.

You have to take into account:

- use of alcohol/drugs. Riding requires hand/eye coordination and quick reflexes. Both things alcohol diminishes

- use of riding gear/safety equipment. A guy on a Harley wearing a plastic helmet that looks cool, vs a rider in full riding gear.

- level of riding ability.

-type of riding. Very aggressive fast riding seems a whole lot more dangerous than cruising and riding defensively

Hi all ! Your chances of having an accident is 5 or 6 times greater after just 1 drink . It is also amazing that the frequency of single vehicle accidents are so great . Those two facts spell it out....don't drink and ride and don't ride over your head .

The statistics on motorcycle related accidents vary much depending on the age of the rider. In de MAIDS report on European two wheelers, which also includes mopeds, tells us that a majority of accidents happen below the age of 24. Between 24-55 the fatality rate is rather similar to car accidents and after the age of 55 the risk is somewhat bigger again.
Now the age of people in combat tends also to be the younger age group. The fatality rate for adults on motorcycles is not that bad.
In the Netherlands they have several types of training. Some are to make you a better rider, some focus on risk recognition. The people who did the latter die less often, the people who did the advanced motorcycle training actually got into more accidents because they dared more and were more focused on the riding than on the dangers.

was the comparison to 'war' just to be overly dramatic? how many people ride 400 miles in a day? not many and certainly not EVERY day. how does it compare to say, swimming or hang gliding or perhaps or the workplace. the whole statement is pointless. it's up to the individual to determine what his/her level of accepted risk is.

The term is Neglect of Probability.

Humans are really, really bad at properly accounting for either highly likely or highly unlikely probabilities. Even though over 30,000 Americans will die in automobile crashes this year almost no one gives it the slightest thought when they get in/on their vehicle. On the flip side, people freak out about boarding a plane or fear lightning strikes or murder at the hands of strangers, all of which are statistically extremely unlikely to ever occur to you.

The use of the micromort metric should clue everyone into the fact that while statistically motorcycle riding is comparable to being a soldier in Afghanistan the odds of death actually are very low for both. Poor diet and lack of exercise is much more likely to kill either one.

How many "jigawatts" do I qualify for?

-Central NJ
-Commute via car on Route 1 during Rush Hour 2x per day
-Approx 25% of local traffic consisting of foreign nationals with <2 yrs driving exp.
-Traffic lights every 21.3 feet
-Police response time to home alarm = 34 minutes (despite living within 1.5 miles of police station)
-Work in a building with medical research laboratories
-In between PHL and NYC
-In between and within 50 miles of numerous military bases
-In between and within 50 miles of multiple nuclear power plants
-Under major flight paths
-Electrical service subscriber
-Access to community pool
-Access to red meat
-Access to Large Soda
-Meteors, Comets
-Bears
-Pitbulls
-Yellowstone Supervolcano
-Global Warming
-Hurricane Sandy
-Justin Beiber

Statistically, I must already be dead.

Eye pro and reflective belts.

Not so, failure to yield (on the part of an auto motorist, usually turning left in front of an oncoming moto) is right up there with excessive speed or riding beyond one's ability. These acciedents usually occur on high speed surface street's close to one's home.

Most serious accidents fall into one of these two categories and are very close to an even split.

Contributing factors are drunkenness and darkness. These are not really causes. Not knowing how to ride is a subjective and infinite scale that cannot easily be quantified, but at least one study shows that those who have had formal training are much less likely to have a serious accident.

Yes, I'm sure it is to be overly dramatic. Most soldiers in Afghanistan see very little, if any actual combat. We have had 10's of thousands of soldiers in Afghanistan for more than 10 years, with less than 3500 killed.

OTH, motorcycling is much more dangerous than most adventure sports, likely including the two you've mentioned. Oft repeated stats say you are 35 times more likely to die in a motorcycle accident than in a a car accident (per mile ridden). Most "adventure sports" are much safer than driving a car, a commonly made comparison.

Dakez is right though, in that there is much that can be done to lower the risk serious injury or death when motorcycling.

#1. Always wear a helmet, gloves and sturdy footwear. Statistically, other gear does not seem to do much is terms of reducing serious injury or death. Abrasion injuries while often painful and scarring are seldom serious.

#2. Never drink and ride and minimize your riding at night.

#3. Learn good motorcycling control and accident avoidance skills and practice them frequently.

#4. Ride conservatively, save excessive speed for the track.

#5. Minimize riding on multi-lane high speed surface streets, especially during high traffic times. Motorbike commuters significantly increase their exposure to risk.

Following these suggestions will significantly lower the hazard level of the sport.