Mae Sot group ride and John's accident 7th Feb 2011

[KTMphil]

Mae Sot group ride and John's accident 7th Feb 2011

I'll start with John's accident to save everyone scrolling down to find it.
WILL ADD MORE, JUST GOT BACK AND THIS HAPPENED YESTERDAY

About 30km north of Mae Sot on R105, Con & Duncan were riding together, passed John & John decided to follow. John went wide on a corner saw a songtail coming the other way, laid the bike down and first the ER-6, then John went into the front of the Songtail. You can see the scrape marks where the bike was laid down.

John hit the Songtail pickup after the bike had bounced off and was trapped under the front axle with his left leg trapped over the fron axle. They got everyone out of the songtail and lifted the front of the pickup and managed to pull John out and lay him at the side of the road.


John's Er-6 after hitting the pickup - flattened fork tube, bent frame, snapped sub frame, totalled

Rob, Ian & Tom looking at the wreckage

The bike when picked up

The Ambulance came very quick from the local town, here the nurse putting a splint on John's broken leg.


Tim using his Thai to try and find out where they will take him


Jeff & Russ went to the hospital with him


Getting John in the ambulance


Getting the Er-6 in the Police pick up

Some more photo's below

Both the radiator on the Er-6 & the songtail exploded in steam

A REALLY spooky thing happened that we cannot explain. Duncan's plastic wallet was found at the crash scene next to John's broken bike. Duncan was ahead of John, never stopped at that curve where this happened and didn't turn back. Also Duncan's credit card was missing from the plastic wallet. Duncan says he ALWAYS keeps the wallet in a zipped pocket on his jacket, the odds of it falling out on that corner where John crashed are 1 billion to 1....... very spooky.

John after his leg pinning operation, was in much better spirits




This is the entrance to the emergency room, lovely trail of blood on the way in

SEE MAE SOT GROUP RIDE 7TH FEB, 2011 PART 2

http://www.rideasia.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=143

 

[Steve Canyon]

Looks nasty man, is he ok?

Speedy recovery I hope, all the best old chap...

 

[bigntall]

Always scary to crash into large immoveable objects. Get well John!!

A hats off to the people around him that got him squared away at a hospital. Always comforting when the chips are down and you have decent friends around you to get you to safety.

 

[Jonadda]

Mend well

 

[Joemac_kint]

get well soon mate. sometimes.. it just happen... SHIT happens...

 

[Grathiam]

Upon viewing the pictures of the accident and damage to the bike and then read that the only major injury suffered was a broken leg. I think that John was very lucky that his injuries weren't more severe! Yet, from the photos and skid marks, it appears that he may have been going to fast to maintain control in his own lane, which likely caused the accident.

The accident reinforces the oft mentioned rule that one should always wear protective gear. In this case, it may have saved his life.

Best wishes for a speedy recovery...

 

[nikster]

Wow - really lucky to come out of this one with only a broken leg!!

Well - from the looks of it there's other minor injuries and I am sure he's bruised as hell. Nevertheless - that was some good safety gear, as well as a large helping of lucky!

Phil, keep us posted on the recovery and all the best to John.

 

[LivinLOS]

Always bad to see a ride end up with a man down.. Hope he makes a full and speedy recovery and a well done to the lads who stepped up and helped him through it.

 

[Bush Pilot]

! Yet, from the photos and skid marks, it appears that he may have been going to fast to maintain control in his own lane, which likely caused the accident.

I've got to wonder if there weren't other contributing factors like some sand or a dog which caused him to loose traction and control. If it was just speed he must have been going way too fast. Pushing that hard anywhere but a racetrack isn't a very good idea.

What a mess! I hope he heals up ok.

 

[nikster]

This seems to be an orange ER-6n which is the 09 model - I think if he'd had ABS, this might have been avoided altogether. It looks like he hit the front brakes too hard, which made the front skid and the bike go down. My first crash on the D-Tracker was exactly that.

With ABS, in the same situation, he would have stayed on the bike, able to take evasive action, and even if it was too late for that, he'd have hit the truck at a slower speed.

Of course yes, I suppose the underlying reason was going too fast in the corner to begin with...

I have been guilty of that once on the epic MHS loop ride on the ER-6n and the ABS very clearly saved me there. Took the corner too fast as I got a bit tired and wasn't paying proper attention - it was a right corner so I was going to go off the road rather than into oncoming traffic. The ground was wet, with sand and leaves on it. Hit the brakes as hard as I could, ABS stuttering set in, and I almost magically slowed down enough to make the corner. PHEW! Never going to get a bike without ABS.

Anyway - good luck with the recovery, and I am hoping John will post something here!

 

[Pikey]

I just got back from visiting John who at the moment is in ICU at CM Ram. He got transferred last week whilst the rest of us were still on the road. Anyway, the score is that he has a busted left tibia, a broken shoulder and some kidney damage which is why he is in ICU. The docs have dialysised (sp?) him twice and now his kidneys are working normally and he's hoping to get transferred to a regular room with TV, DVD e.t.c to start his recovery. He is in good spirits and others are travelling to Mae Sot to recover his (wreck of a) bike later this week.

FYI, the cause of the accident was pure rider error - as others have said, and as John admits himself, he just went in too fast. No dogs, kids, rabbits, aliens with diesel squirting water pistols e.t.c. Having said that, there is a lot of other debris thrown off the road in that corner - plastics from pickup trucks e.t.c so although it looked like a pretty standard left hander, it's claimed victims before.

I'm not sure what the crack for visiting John is so if you plan to do so, probably best to leave it for a few days and then phone ahead to CM Ram. I'm going to go again tuesday after I finish work and will post again with any updates.

Cheers,

Pikey.

 

[Bush Pilot]

Thanks for that honest info.

I hope it gives some perspective for all and especially myself as to how we should approach riding around here.

I've had my share of accidents here and I know how hard these lessons are.

 

[DrGMIA]

Visited John yesterday. For a guy taking on the front end of a truck, and losing, he was in pretty good spirits.

He's a long way to go before he'll be sliding rear tires living by the axiom of "Keep the power under control." He's positive about motorcycle driving again though.

While in his room I noted that he was constantly toying with the emergency call button. At first I thought it was because he was close to a pain threshold. He admitted when asked that pushing the button summoned a covey of pretty nurses, and that he was trying to think of a reason to give them when they arrived.

His sense of humor was good.

 

[Pikey]

Here's a bit of info on the route we took. No pics but looking at Russ's Facebook page I see he took a shedload so maybe he'd like to add?

Here you go:

Day 1. Chiang Mai to Mae Sot

Met at Riders Corner and had a hearty breakfast and then left Chiang Mai at about 09:45 headed south on the 108 for Hot. Due to the different types of bikes & speed of riders, we decided to regroup at Hot market before following the river via Ob Luang to Mae Sarieng. This is a ripper of a road and very picturesque with not too much traffic.

We arrived in Mae Sarieng for lunch where we regrouped again only to then split into 2 groups so as we could get lunch done in a reasonable amount of time as there were 12 of us. We ate at a couple of restaurants down by the river - simple but filling fayre.

The afternoon was a blat down the 105 to Mae Sot where about 70km before our overnight destination, John had his unfortunate coming together with the local school songtaew. Again, as has been said before, praises for all involved - Thai and farang for the cooperation in minimizing the trauma to John although as Hoghead said, the "ambulance" and it's accompanying facilities were somewhat lacking. John was taken to the local hospital in Tha Song Yang where he was x-rayed and the extent of his injuries was logged. At this time, me and Russ were with him and all I remember him saying is "f*ck, f*ck, f*ck" repeatedly as he was in a hell of a lot of pain and they wouldn't/couldn't give him anything for it until they assessed him.

After talking with the police and doctors and getting the news that he would be stabilized there and then be transferred to Mae Sot hospital, myself & Russ left for Mae Sot. After catching up with the others at The First Hotel (350/night - big room), showering & eating, a few of us went to MS hospital to check on John. He was still in a lot of pain but better and comforted by the fact that his GF was on her way from Chiang Mai.

OK - one man down but no excuse not to party! We ended up in some dodgy area with some beer bars but probably because of the events of the day and the fact that we'd done about 400km on twisties, it was a subdued evening.

Day 2. Mae Sot to Loei

Up bright & early and breakfast at Krua Canadian where we ate the night before. Great food in there BTW. After brekkie it was a mass visit to John who was in a lot better shape than the day before and had Noi by his side.

We left MS and gassed up on the way out of town before heading east on the 105 to Tak where we said goodbye to Dave & Phil who had to return to CM before picking up highway 12 and hammering thru Sukhothai and Phitsanoluk, stopping at Nakhon Thai for lunch. The higway is high speed and I had the Bonnie pinned at around 140 - 150 most of the way. Looking at my "wingmen" in the mirrors, I couldn't stop myself thinking about Mad Max and warriors of the wasteland kind of stuff. Nine loud bikes travelling at a relatively high speed must be an impressive sight to a bystander!

After lunch we took the great 2013 & 203 roads via Dan Sai to Loei where we plotted up in the King Hotel for 500/night and ate up the road at a steak house/Italian. After that it was a mooch around town, a few beers and off to bed.

450km travelled today.

Day 3. Loei to Nan

The morning saw us saying goodbye to a few more riders leaving the nucleus of myself and Bungy on our Triumphs, Con & Duncan on ER6s, and Russell on his KLX250 which although underpowered for yesterday's high spped stuff would be perfect for the unknown road conditions ahead.

The group headed to CM backtracked to Dan Sai before heading home via route 11/Uttaradit whilst we decided to head north to Chiang Khan and follow the Thai/Laos border before cutting in to Nan via a national park. The road to Chiang Khan was fine - pretty fast and open but after then what we'd been told was "a bit potholey" turned out to be a mix of potholes and no road at all - just rough gravel sand & dust where the tarmac had either been completely worn away or had been scraped off in prepapation for resurfacing. Either way, it made for quite a bit on up on the pegs riding but was fun. Lunch was looked for but skipped as nothing suitable presented itself. After a great ride on the 1083 through a national park, we arrived in Nan and checked into the Grand Mansion before heading out to Da Darios for an early start on the beer & pizza. Total 425km today.

Day 4. Nan to Chiang Rai

Up bright and early due to us all being tired/drunk by about 10pm the night before and off north out of town towards Pua to pickup the 1148. A stop in Song Khwae for a much needed Sponsor drink and then onto Chiang Kham for a KFC lunch. After lunch we headed towards Thoen but split off right before the town onto the 1155. Taking the 1155 north in the Phu Chi Fa area and there is a turn to the left for the Phiya Phiyak road (Doi Yao?). This road looks spectacular from across the vally but riding it reveals it's very tight and steep and difficult to put a flowing ride together. The road does intersect with the 1020 where you can do a left back to Thoen. A bit of a tip here if you are heading to Chiang Rai - don't follow the signs to CR, rather go via Phaya Mengrai/Wiang Chai and save yourself 30km over the signposted route. We arrived in CR mid afternoon and Bungy got us a decent rate (900b) at the Wiang Come hotel right in the heart of things. After a massage & some beers, things got a bit messy which meant a delayed midday start back to CM the next day. Day 4 mileage - 300km and day 5 back to CM via the 1/118 approx 180km.

Great trip, great roads, great travelling buddies and although John is not exactly where he wants to be, like others have said, it could have been a lot, lot worse.

Cheers,

Pikey.

 

[KTMphil]

Shame I couldn't have made the rest of that trip - It was a great bunch of guys, really enjoyable, will go again any time.

 

[KTMphil]

I've just got back from seeing John today and he is on the up and up.

He thinks he should be out of the Hospital in a week or so, the delay is getting his kidneys to function normally after all the hard work they've done with muscle damage.

He says his feet hurt the most now, but the seeing the nurses numbs the pain. My left leg was warm, I looked down and it was pressed against his urine bag.

Hope you're well soon.