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Understanding and mitigating the dangers of riding a motorcycle

On Behalf of | Jul 11, 2024 | Motorcycle Accidents

When you ride a motorcycle, there are many things you can do to stay safe. You can wear a properly certified motorcycle helmet. You can buy an expensive set of riding leathers, which help prevent road rash. You can focus on the color of your motorcycle or your gear, choosing something that is highly visible so that you stand out – rather than wearing a black outfit on a black bike.

Even if you do all of this, your odds of being involved in a fatal accident are much higher than if you’re in in a passenger vehicle. Simply by virtue of being on a motorcycle, statistics show that the accident fatality odds are 22 times greater than if you’re on four wheels.

How can you protect yourself?

The best way to protect yourself is to become a defensive rider, anticipating that the people you are sharing the road with are going to make mistakes. Defensive driving means keeping longer following distances, obeying the speed limit and paying extra close attention to the vehicles around you. This will help you avoid being distracted while riding, and it can help you be ready to react immediately if someone else drifts over the center line or starts to merge into your lane because they don’t see you.

Unfortunately, even defensive riding won’t prevent all collisions. Many motorcycle accidents happen in a split second, when a driver makes a critical error. If you have been seriously injured or lost a loved one in such a crash, you need to know what legal steps to take.

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