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10 Sep 2006, 12:45 pm / Hurt
Well, I became an official member of the club last night....
Marty & I went out riding last night with a few friends. Marty was leading on his Wing, then "D" was on his Sporty, then me on my X, then "T" on my old Shadow (she has only a learners permit, hasn't taken the MSF course), then her hubby "T" on his Wide Glide, then "C" & "N" on our old Wing. We hit a spot on Hwy 21, just South of I-95, where they were repaving. Earlier in the day, when I had come through in my cage, the left lane had been repaved. "T" was worried about going through there, but I told her not to worry, it was paved in one lane. We got there, and both lanes had been milled (apparently didn't pass specs, and had to be repaved). We came to the first over pass, and the contractor had not put any asphalt on the joint to the bridge, and there was about a 2-2 1/2' inch drop. I was doing about 40 mph, braced up and rode through it fine. About 1/4 mile later, there was another overpass, and I could see that there was still no asphalt on the joint, no marker signs, and this drop was worse, about 2 1/2-3". I rolled off of my throttle, and was fixin' to brace up to take and rise. "T" didn't realize I had slowed, panicked and locked up her rear wheel. She started to fish tail, came flying by me and knocked into me (I was to the left in the lane at this point, she was to the right) and got me loose. I was maintianing ok, riding it out, when she swerved back and knocked me again, just as I hit the ridge. My bike started to go down, high sided me. I went flying, landed on my right elbow and lower back and head. I started to roll. The bike started to roll and slide. Then, the engine guard caught it, luckily, and made it spin, which is the only thing that stopped it from rolling on me. Fortunately, no vehichles were following too closely to us. Thank god for safety gear. My elbow is pretty banged up, I have a knot on my head, my whole a$$ cheek is scraped and bruised, through my thick jeans, and my knee is pretty banged up (the knee that is all screws and rods to begin with!), but otherwise ok. It knocked the wind out of me at first, but I basically walked away. My Joe Rocket mesh jacket with armour saved me, as did my helmet. "T" finally came to a sliding stop,, and her engine guard saved her bike. She tried to catch it and bruised her leg, too.
Fortunately, I went down in good company. "T" is a foreman with the GADOT in our county (the next county over from where this happened), as well as battalion chief for the VFD there. His wife, "T" is a professional EMT, "D" is a volunteer fireman and first responder and "C" is a mechanic with the company that has the contract paving that area (they were paving in the lanes going north bound, right across from where this happened at the time!) They should've had signs out for motorcycle warning about the bump on both sides of the highway and didn't, as well as asphalt at the joint. "T" had the cop note that in the report. They investigated and agreed that it was no fault of any of ours, no tickets were written. The paving guys came over and were like, "Ma'am, we are so sorry. We were meaning to get that asphalt on that joint, but we have been so far behind and working 24 hr/day to get caught up on this job, all we had time to do was put remilled material down" (Most of that was blown over to the side of the road, with all of the traffic from I-95 and the Ga ports in there.) The engineer in charge of the project was called and told what happened, and told them, yep, contractors fault. We had a camera with us, and took pics of the scene, noting no signs, the size of the drop off.
Meanwhile, my poor bike is unridable. It bent the handlebars, snapped the brake lever, snapped the windshield in two, bent the front fork, engine guard, brake pedal, throttle cable (we just put those on Friday, as well as risers!!), as well as cosmetic damage to the Beetle bags (bowed them out from impact, shattering the right brake light, plus about wore them through from sliding!), gas tank passenger peg, pipes, brake resevoir cover, mirrors, and it dinged my balls!!! My helmet is knicked, too.
My poor bike *sigh*, now I have to ride "b-yatch" for a few weeks. But at least I can ride again (and Brody was not with us, luckily!)
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