Deliberately pushed off - Kent

[661-Pete]

Very sorry to hear about that awful experience Rob - please PLEASE give don't let it get to you, please continue to give cycling a chance! I can understand the unpleasant flashbacks. You will get over that. Stay on the bike.

Such attacks are rare, but yours is almost a carbon-copy of an incident that happened to me, back in 1982. Yes! That's right, twenty-eight years ago. I still remember the occasion clearly though I no longer have 'flash-backs' about it: it was on the B2112 between Ditchling and Clayton in Sussex, a road I still cycle on now and again. Difference was, I was on my own and there were no witnesses, and of course I had no reg. number to go on. I went to the police but, naturally, they couldn't help. After all those years the trail has certainly gone cold, but I still wonder, if the offender is still alive, and remembers what they did, (and maybe is reading this!), and has a fit of remorse, the Law could still take its course.

Offenders who are caught and convicted for doing this, I'd like to see banged up in the slammer, no 'soft' option, no 'community service' or such nonsense. These are individuals who it is not safe for the rest of us, to have them at large.

 

[661-Pete]

Having read this, and several other mentions of the benefits of cameras, I'm rather tempted to un-mothball my old ATC 2000, which I bought about two years ago and have only had on the bike once! Even if I don't suffer any such incident myself, it's just conceivable I might get in frame a vehicle involved in an incident with someone else, further down the road. By carefully co-ordinating times of footage, and comparing notes on these forums, may be possible to pin someone down (this has been suggested in Clarion's thread).

In my case it's less likely since I cycle only short distances and mostly on routes less frequented by cyclists. But you never know. Time to see if the camera's still in working order, methinks...

 

[ianrauk]

Hi Rob,
I rode that stretch of road on the way back from the FNRttC saturday afternoon. Cars do seem to speed along there and I have had a couple of close passes there myself. As BentMikey quite rightly says above. This part of Kent has a bit of a reputation for this type of thing.

Don't let these idiots put you off Cycling Rob.

Where about's are you? You are more then welcome to join a few of us Cycle Chat Bromley peeps on a Sunday morning ride out. We meet in Bromley at 8.30 most Sundays for a jaunt into London and back.

 

[dodgy]

Can't believe your mate didn't get the full registration plate! Glad you're not seriously hurt!

 

[Alaskan Rob]

Thanks for the replies guys

To answer some of the questions / further comments:

Yes we didn't get the full reg unfortunately, after being hit I did have the presence of mind to look at the vehicle to get make and model and colour, but could only look for a fraction of a second as I was out of control at high speed. My mate did the same as it passed him, but when it hit me and I flew off, his eyes focused on me as I cartwheeled into the trees, rather than the reg plate in full, but he saw the 'H', but he was pretty shocked as well.

Interestingly, as well as two road traffic police, two police officers on mountain bikes came by. They said that last week they had pulled over a vehicle of the same description, with a 'H' in the reg for anti-social driving, but they couldn't link this as we didn't have enough details. But reading the reports Google has brought up there is definitely something of a trend of similar attacks in this area, some with very serious injuries and death.

I did think that if my mate hadn't witnessed it, and I had been killed, when I had been found they would of just thought 'oh just a cyclist lost control on a downhill'. The fact there's been a number of these attacks means there's definitely something going on here. In one of the cases the guy broke his back and has been unable to work since, lost his income and suffers depression as a result. The Police say in that case if found they them would be charged with GBH, but I'd have thought it should really be attempted murder.

Since the last accident in 2008 I have really stepped up and improved my rear observation, but it's just not practical to eyeball and look long enough to take a mental note of every registration, or certainly I'm not good enough to do it! I need to look ahead for all the potholes on our roads!

Cameras are great and I use the Muvi on my motorbike into work. Problem is that yesterday we were in the saddle for 5 hours, on saturday we had done a 12 hour ride. Constantly changing camera's / batteries / cards seems a bit impractical over that duration. Although what camera has the longest recording capability? I might look into that.

I think there are just generally a lot of people who are just scum, who have nothing going for themselves. I just can't get my head around that they can't empathise that while I'm not related to them, I am related to other people; would they like this to happen to their sister, friend, niece or godson, etc. If it was one of their family killed in this way would they sit at the funeral secretly excited by it all? The mind boggles that they just can't put themselves in the position of imaging how would they feel if a member of their family was hurt as a victim of this.

Oh, the Police 999 operator was totally useless. Within two minutes of being knocked off, I'd dug my phone out and called 999. They automatically know your number and I told them my name, and that I wasn't bleeding to death or anything, but I wanted to tell them ASAP the road I was on and the direction of travel of the pick-up and it's description - hopefully there might be Police in the area they could alert. But no the useless idiot wanted to know my full address, DOB, and half a dozen other non-time critical facts before they would take the vehicle details.

I agree people are creatures of habit, I think I may well be traveling those parts again with a few mates this time in different vehicles and with cameras; strange things can happen out there when people least expect it, as I now know.

Ian, thank you, I may well take you up on that in a little while. I'm in Greenwich. Must say it was the first time I'd cycled that area and I thought it was fantastic and was looking forward to going back. I thought riding in a two would be safer than riding alone, maybe a group would be better still.

 

[redflightuk]

A few years ago i had a Vitara come across to my side of the road with a thug hanging out of the rear window arm out at my neck height, i waited as late as i could and just held my fist up at his face height. Heard a nice thud as his skull hit the door as he tried to pull himself back into the car. Never had time to look at the reg as it all happened so quickly. Hope you heel quickly.

 

[Fixedwheelnut]

An L200 Mitsubushi sounds like normal attire for the local campsite brigade, camps at Crockenhill, Swanley, Horton Kirby, Darenth and West Kingsdown

There has been a spate of these type of attacks, the one in Shire Lane in 2008 and another by the Spinning Wheel where a friend Adrian was pushed in the bushes but unhurt.

I'll keep my eye out, I often use that road and never had a problem there myself but the Swanley/Crockenhill youths try their luck sometimes.

 

[Bollo]

Not much to add to the previous posts ARob, but a big GWS from me.

 

[groucho73]

Same thing happened to me on my commute through Sunderland a couple of months ago. Luckily i managed to keep my balance and i set off in pursuit hoping that i'd catch up to the tossers when they had to stop at the lights. Anyhow i didn't manage to catch them but when it happens you just feel this sense of shock and then rage takes over and the thought of taking a reg.no is the last thing on your mind

 

[cyberknight]

Hope you heal soon and the bike is ok.

From my dealings with the coppers a while back they really do not give a s**t .Even when you have the reg ,description and whereabouts of the offender they will do sweet FA without other witnesses .

 

[HLaB]

Grrr I hate idiots like that, they see things in cartoons, etc and think its funny, when are they going to grow up and realise this is a real world with real consequences.

 

[Crankarm]

Hang in there AR. This or these idiots need to be caught.

I remember last year reading an article in the comic Cycling Weekly that a vehicle made a number of attempts buzzing club riders, in this instance I think it was the Port Sunlight Wheelers. Anyway a couple of the riders were coppers who id'd the vehicle finding it to be owned by a local lad, but perversely couldn't do anything as the CPS said they couldn't do anything as the coppers had failed to properly identify the driver or something to this effect. Anyway the driver seemed to have a pathological hatred of cyclists and would in all likelihood soon kill cyclists. Unfortunately I don't know what happened whether the police did actually nail him or not, but his driving was clearly done in a manner to scare and likley off cyclists causing injury or death.

There are real head cases out there. D-locking them would merely make a mess of a nice D-lock.

 

[dodgy]

I've had my fair share of hassles while riding. For some reason around here it's passengers slapping me on the arse that seems the most popular form of merriment.

I always get the registration plate - always.

People need to practice this 'skill'.

 

[GrumpyGregry]

I've taken a leaf out of Johnthemonkey's book, or is it notepad.

topeak or similar tri bag on the toptube, with my mobile and a folded blank post card and pencil (not a pen as pencils still work in the wet) in it.

very useful in such circumstances for jotting down notes and registration numbers.

Which I remember by chanting them over and over again until I write them down.

 

[Sheffield_Tiger]

Grrr I hate idiots like that, they see things in cartoons, etc and think its funny, when are they going to grow up and realise this is a real world with real consequences.

When we push them off a cliff and drop an ACME 1 TON weight on their heads?

Sorry, maybe not the best thread for a joke but couldn't resist.

On the point about operators..yes, they are a bloody nuisance. I once encountered a broken down vehicle on a 70mph Dual Carriageway just after a bend (about the sharpest bend you can have on such a road, on the A63 under the Humber Bridge)

I phoned the police at the next layby to warn them so they could get a car out there and close the lane to prevent an accident and they wanted to know all my details, why I was travelling to Hull etc etc. I ended up telling them "you know about the hazard, it's up to you if you can be bothered" and putting the phone down.