INSIDER RIDER DOWN

JOY BURGESS

He didn’t know, which scared him… and me. “Keep him talking,” I thought.

“Tell me about your bike,” I asked, while I continued applying compression to his head wounds and trying to keep him calm as I noticed it also looked like he had a broken collarbone. “I’m a rider, too.”

“I ride a Harley,” he responded. Good! He remembered something

He did finally remember his name, but a few minutes later he began to fade on me again. “Don’t go to sleep,” I urged. “You’ve gotta keep talking to me.” Where was that ambulance?

It was probably just a few seconds later, but it felt like forever before I finally heard the wail of sirens. And that was enough to extinguish his lethargy.

“I can’t have no ambulance,” he told me, frantically trying to move. “I don’t have insurance.”

“You’ve gotta stay still,” I countered. “I don’t know what all you hurt. They’ll just take a look at you; you don’t have to go to the hospital.”

Trying to keep a 6-ft, 240-pound man who’s injured and becoming combative from moving is no easy task. And to my relief, a fire truck pulled up and four firemen jumped out to help me, with the ambulance rolling in not far behind.

Help had arrived. I gave them the details on what happened and gratefully let them take over, shaking as the adrenaline wore off.

It’d been a minute since I’d had to jump in and care for someone injured at that level. And that experience left me with a few important thoughts.

One, please wear a helmet. I’ve always believed that. But when you get an up-close-and-personal view of someone’s head and face after it smacks pavement without a helmet, it underscores that thought in a big way!

The AMA encourages voluntary helmet use, while it does oppose mandatory helmet laws for adult riders. The AMA’s position on mandatory helmet laws can be found at https://americanmotorcyclist. com/voluntary-helmet-use/

Two, it’s a great idea for riders to get some first-aid training. AMA partner the United States Motorcycle Coaching Association (USMCA) requires coaches to become certified in basic AHA or Red Cross First Aid and CPR, along with learning how to manage concussions and how to detect signs of heat illness and cardiac arrest.

You don’t have to be a coach for that to be a smart idea. Whether riding off- or on-road, if someone you’re with gets hurt you might be the only one standing between them and death. We don’t like to think about it, but crashes happen. And what happens in that first hour after someone is injured often has life-anddeath consequences.

Three, carry a basic first aid kit whenyou ride. Knowing how to help someone who’s injured is important; having the tools to do so makes a difference.

Hopefully you’ll never need to use lifesaving measures on someone you’re riding with; but be prepared. You just might save someone’s life someday.

The Arai Difference

No matter how good a helmet is, the amount of energy that can be absorbed is inherently limited. Faced with an impact that exceeds that limit, Arai’s belief is that avoiding energy by Glancing Off is essential to keeping that energy away from the inside of the helmet.

Arai is still a small, family-owned company driven by the same mission through three generations – three generations of riders. We at Arai are motorcycle enthusiasts. We ride. We build each Arai helmet as if we’re creating it for one of our own – a brother, a father, a husband, a mother, a sister.

Arai’s mission has always been the protection and comfort of every person who chooses an Arai helmet. Our foundational principles of protection first, exceptional quality, and rider comfort have never been forgotten in over six decades of helmet design and manufacturing. This is Arai Helmet.