Two men were taken to the hospital, one with serious injury, following a collision between a motorcycle and a truck on Victory Highway in Burrillville early Sunday evening.
In this case, it appears that the motorcyclist may have crossed over into the northbound lane while he was traveling southbound. As is often the case when motorcycle meets truck, the motorcyclist was much more injured than the truck driver and remains hospitalized.
Motorcyclists tend to get more injured than car or truck drivers whenever they are involved in a collision because their vehicle obviously doesn’t give them any protection from impact. There have been a lot of improvements in motorcycle protective equipment even including body airbags that deploy instantly upon collision. However, advanced protective equipment such as these air bags are not yet widely in use and the type of equipment that is regularly used by motorcycle riders provides limited protection.
If the motorcyclist did cross into the oncoming lane the accident would certainly be his fault, but without video, impartial eyewitnesses, skid marks, etc., it may be difficult to know which vehicle was in the wrong lane. Helmet cams are another device that aids in determining what happened in an accidnet and who is at fault, but there is no indication that motorcyclist or the truck driver had cameras actively recording at the time of the accident.
From NRINOW News:
BURRILLVIILE – Two men were taken to the hospital, one with serious injury, following a collision between a motorcycle and a truck on Victory Highway early Sunday evening.
The crash reportedly took place around 5:20 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 12 in the area by Bella Restaurant. The area has seen increased traffic in recent months due to a detour to accommodate reconstruction of nearby Mohegan Bridge.
The road between Bella and Western Hotel was shut down for around two and a half hours, with police and several village fire departments at the scene.
Both drivers were taken to Rhode Island Hospital, with the truck driver, a man from Somerset, Mass., treated and released. The motorcycle driver, a man from Manville, remains hospitalized with a serious leg injury, according to Lt. Jason Cahill.
Man injured in Sunday motorcycle accident in Burrillville