The CycleChat Helmet Debate Thread

[Mugshot]

They have no relevance to the original question

Hyperthetical peds have no relevance on a hyperthetical pavement?

 

[Deleted member 26715]

Hyperthetical peds have no relevance on a hyperthetical pavement?

None whatsoever as they were not included in the original scenario, along with the dog that is or is not chasing the ball across the road, or the couple having unprotected sex in the park around the corner as to whether she will or will not get pregnant.

 

[ufkacbln]

Bike helmets are not classed as PPE anyway, you know that.

why is that?

Dunno? Why dont you explain?

Some years ago the Post Office decided to make helmets compulsory for their employees on bicycles, the HSE was consulted and refused to support the action. It was the HSE who stated that helmets did not meet the criteria of PPE in this case

Without the support of HSE they were forced to make helmets a piece of "uniform" and enforce it that way

 

[ufkacbln]

Hypothetical question.

Cyclist standing near some scaffolding with his bicycle about to cross a road, when one of the workmen on the scaffolding looses the grip on a 2lb hammer, it falls off the scaffolding falling 20 feet & striking the cyclist on the head. Would the potential injury the cyclist received be greater or less if he was wearing a cycling helmet?

The melon test in a new form
The flawed and ridiculous test that proves a lot of things, most of which will be dismissed as irrelevant cause they are inconvenient

Replace the helmet with a melon and prove unequivocally that cyclist should wear arf shelled fruits

Reality is that you can also put a pedestrian in the same place and prove equally unequivocally that pedestrians should wear fruits with hard shells

Or back to the original and prove that pedestrians are fully exchangeable for cyclists and the outcome would be unchanged


Still, pedestrians will be excluded simply because including them shows just how worthless and flawed this "test" is

 

[Mugshot]

None whatsoever as they were not included in the original scenario, along with the dog that is or is not chasing the ball across the road, or the couple having unprotected sex in the park around the corner as to whether she will or will not get pregnant.

Ok, so just to be clear, we have a scenario where there is scaffolding, a fella up the scaffolding around 20ft or so, that drops a 2lb lump hammer, which hits a cyclist, there are and cannot be any peds, dogs, parks or couples and one would assume spoons in this hyperthetical situation? I think the hammer sprouts wings and flies away, which is about as likely as all the other conditions which you have applied occuring.
However, assuming the hammer hits the cyclist in an area of the helmet which has got head beneath it and does not strike anywhere else, please keep in mind just how much bigger a helmet makes your head and just how much more likely it is to be hit than a bare head, then I would say it is likely that the helmet would offer some protection. But before you start calling for the thread to be closed as you have single handedly ended the debate once and for all, what you have actually rather neatly demonstrated with your insistance on ever decreasing parameters is how extraordinarily unlikely it all is, the chances of what you have described are so remote as to be quite frankly absurd.
Page after page of this thread have stated that in some circumstances helmets may be of some benefit, but that the actual chances of such a case occuring are very very remote, if the point of your scenario was to prove that then it was well played

 

[doog]

The other question with the deer incident is that if eye witness accounts are to be believed the animals were visible for some time

The photographer had enough time to get out his camera, set it up predict and plan the shot

Rather than relying on a helmet, perhaps adequate observation of one's surroundings, slowing down and taking avoiding action would be a better option for longer term safety

However you choose to dress it up doesn't negate the fact he fell off his bike and onto his head. You seem desperate to avoid acknowledging this basic fact by skirting around the issue in your usual fashion by saying his hands hit the ground first, or was it is foot or he should have avoided a leaping deer that may have appeared in the corner of his eye. Anything else you want to throw in ?

 

[Mugshot]

However you choose to dress it up doesn't negate the fact he fell off his bike and onto his head. You seem desperate to avoid acknowledging this basic fact by skirting around the issue in your usual fashion by saying his hands hit the ground first, or was it is foot or he should have avoided a leaping deer that may have appeared in the corner of his eye. Anything else you want to throw in ?

I'll throw something in . None of what you've said negates the fact that if you wear a helmet incase a deer jumps on your head you're a first class pillock.

 

[Big Andy]

I'll throw something in . None of what you've said negates the fact that if you wear a helmet incase a deer jumps on your head you're a first class pillock.

Indeed. However I bet there's nobody out there that wears a helmet in case a deer jumps on their head.
There may be many of us though that wear one in case an unknown event happens that leads to a head impact.

 

[Mugshot]

Indeed. However I bet there's nobody out there that wears a helmet in case a deer jumps on their head.
There may be many of us though that wear one in case an unknown event happens that leads to a head impact.

Like hyperthetical hammers you mean?

 

[Big Andy]

Like hyperthetical hammers you mean?

Not really no. A vanishingly small chance of that happening. A risk so tiny it really is not worth considering as is the deer landing on your head.
Hypotheticals are a bit pointless really.

 

[ufkacbln]

However you choose to dress it up doesn't negate the fact he fell off his bike and onto his head. You seem desperate to avoid acknowledging this basic fact by skirting around the issue in your usual fashion by saying his hands hit the ground first, or was it is foot or he should have avoided a leaping deer that may have appeared in the corner of his eye. Anything else you want to throw in ?

I can only apologise if you are feeling uncomfortable with the possibility that his fall could have been lessened by at least part of the energy being absorbed by his limbs, and wish to deny this, thus making the helmet wholly responsible


I can also only apologise if you feel that accident prevention by being aware of your surroundings, what is happening and adjusting your speed and actions accordingly is unacceptable when you can simply rely on a helmet to save you rather than prevent the accident in the first place


It is the absurd denial that any other factor apart from the helmet can or should be considered in an accident, and the concept that riders do not need to take care as they will be -protected by the helmet that is being challenged


Accident prevention is a proven way of reducing injuries in cyclists and should be the first recourse

 

[ufkacbln]

They have no relevance to the original question

How's about a "test" where we assess speeding, but exclude BMWs, Audis, Sports cars, Hatchbacks, family cars, petrol driven cars, diesel cars, hybrid cars, and all cars with doors as they are all irrelevant to the test?


Thus proving that all speeding is performed by Renault Twizzy owners

 

[Big Andy]

I can only apologise if you are feeling uncomfortable with the possibility that his fall could have been lessened by at least part of the energy being absorbed by his limbs, and wish to deny this, thus making the helmet wholly responsible

Undoubtedly some of the impact of my vast 19st bulk hitting the ground was absorbed by my limbs and ribs. Ive got the cuts and bruises and painful ribs to testify to that. However that does not mean that the impact to the head if unprotected would have been small enough so there will have been no injury, we have no way of knowing. Based on my recollection of the impact I very much suspect there would have been some level of head injury, possibly beyond a scrape. The helmet, in my humble opinion was probably responsible for preventing that injury.

 

[ufkacbln]

Not really no. A vanishingly small chance of that happening. A risk so tiny it really is not worth considering as is the deer landing on your head.
Hypotheticals are a bit pointless really.

This is the biggest issue, where some pro helmet campaigners use ridiculously small cohorts, or high risk activities to promote helmet use for ALL cyclists

Is the rare occurrence of being hit by a deer at a speed exacerbated by the fact it was a race really relevant to the cyclist pooling down the road to the shops at 10 mph?

 

[Big Andy]

I can also only apologise if you feel that accident prevention by being aware of your surroundings, what is happening and adjusting your speed and actions accordingly is unacceptable when you can simply rely on a helmet to save you rather than prevent the accident in the first place

Prevention is always the best option. I am sure everyone will agree. However 100% prevention cannot be guaranteed, its sort of the nature of accidents, they happen.