Page 2 - Helmets that Saved a Head Display

Participant in the 2006 Perimeter Ride

She was trying to follow the group ahead of her and cut across Madison St. without benefit of a stop light or stop sign. The other group had made it. But she didn't. She was hit from behind and flew onto the hood and slid up and smashed into the windshield
shattering it. The car tried to stop and she slid back down landing on
her feet as if she were running, and suddenly her legs collapsed and
she went down.

Her helmet was smashed inside and out. But the hospital checked her out and released her that evening. Her helmet did its job.





Andre Kopp early photos



Andre Kopp - November, 2002


Andre Kopp - Chicago

I basically did a big drop/jump and didnt pull my front wheel up, resulting
in a fine face plant. I got up right away and asked my friends "Holy
shit...is this hospital material?" Obviously it was, and they threw me in a
cab that got me to the ER, while they walked my bike there. Without the
helmet I had bad road rash on half my face, a nasty gash under my nose, and
a terrible sprain on my wrist...which is not much considering a guy doing
the same stunt without a helmet woul have had a concussion/probable skull
damage and other nice things i'd rather not think about.

The photo above shows you that Andre's road rash is serious.
His brain was left intact thanks to the helmet pictured next to his face..


Jim Redd - Chicago

I wore this helmet three years. As you can see by the cracks and nicks, it's saved me from the emergency room more than once. There were dramatic occasions like when I did a 360 screaming down the side of a mountain in Copper Canyon, Mexico, and less sensational incidents like slipping on wet pavement a block from my house after a few too many beers. Most are somewhere in between. But let me tell you, once you lose control, no matter how fast you are going or where you are, your fate is up for grabs and sometimes your helmet is the only thing between you and organ donorship.

I was riding through the alley near my house, watching for ice. Since it was dark I didn't see the low hanging cable TV wire which was diagonal across my path. The cable slid across my face and mouth eventually "clotheslining" me, knocking me flat on my back and causing me to smack my head. I saw that horrible flash of light.

Thing is I was only going for a quick errand and I almost didn't wear the helmet...

(Cable TV is dangerous!)

About 20 years ago - when hardly anybody ever wore a helmet and the only one available was the big Bell Biker - white with red stripes - I was doing a century ride starting in DeKalb, IL. I was riding alone and going pretty fast when I took a left turn, met some gravel and the next thing I remember...

It was 24 hours later and I was in a hospital.

I've been afraid to ride that fast ever since.

I had a helmet - but even with the helmet I had a concussion. Because I had the helmet, I'm here today to tell this story.

Now I have another story - 2006. Memorial Day weekend. I'm riding with the Chicago Cycling Club on a suburban bike path. I have stuff fastened to my aero bars that's never been fastened that way before. The stuff falls and stops my front wheel from moving. There's nobody around but me and my bike. I fall on the paved bike path and my helmet is cracked completely lthrough. It's totally my own fault. But I'm fine! I go back to my car and take the emergency-in-case-I-forget-my helmet and continue the ride.

Gregory Chambers

In 1998 I busted two helmets. I can't say whether each was life-saving, but they certainly saved a concussion or even worse injury. I even have two "Saved by the Bell (helmet)" certificates!

In 1996 I was riding solo on a rural blacktop. I passed a farmhouse that had two dogs that gave chase. I decided to outrun them, which I did. But as I neared the end of their range something happened. My next memory is sitting along the side of the road with a strange woman
staring me in the face. I had crashed and had been unconscious for a while. She had come down the road and found me lying there. She assumed I had been a victim of a hit and run and might possibly be dead because I was not moving. An ambulance came shortly after and took me
to a hospital. I had landed on my left side. I had abrasions on my leg, elbow and face. My helmet had the foam smashed on the left side. It had done its job. I did not have a concussion and was able to go home once the abrasions were cleaned up. The helmet was a Trek and they replaced it because I crashed mine. I had to send my old one to them.

I went riding without my helmet one night, even after my best friend's dad had reminded me to take it. I declared it my "Celebrate my health insurance day." Seriously, I did!! I did not know what would happen late that night.

We went to a party and were quite toasty riding back. My bike and my friend's bike got tangled, we both fell and I didn't do a good job protecting my head.

I went to bed without great concern but woke up with the usual pain of a concussion. Went to the ER that afternoon - it was a concussion.

The experience taught me and when I fell approximately 2 weeks later due to wet pavement and front wheel brake usage, my helmet saved me from a second concussion that would have been dangerous as close as it was to the first one.

I haved not ridden much without a helmet after this incident and don't intend to. I like it now. Keeps me warm in the winter.

When I first started riding daily again (4-5 years ago) I didn't have a helmet. One day I finally realized that I should get one, so I rode to a bike shop, got a helmet, and on the way home my front wheel got caught in a hole in the street (not a pot hole, but a hole that you could see the sewer through), flipping me over the handlebars of my bike and landing more or less head first.

Needless to say, I always wear a helmet now.

I wish I had my old helmets to give you, Either I'm accident prone or take too many risks but helmets have saved my life twice once on the road and once off. I took a header on a mtn pass descent at 30+ miles an hour. Flying through the air in human cannonball form I remember thinking this is going to hurt, but landing on my head didn't it was the sausage grinder gravel that got me, but I'm still alive to feel it thanks to my helmet Another mountain biker I was out with had a helmet we displayed at our bike shop. He took a header into a tree and a nub from the tree pushed into the helmet leaving only 2 millimeters of foam between bark and his head. In college our local
bikeshop had a motto plastered all over his shop of which I too am now an evangelist
NO HELMET? NO BIKE!

I used to ride down Commonwealth Avenue in Boston, Massachusetts in my daily commute to/from downtown Boston, where I worked. There is a long, steep hill where I would pedal in my biggest gear, sailing along with the traffic. Cars often parked in the lane closest to the sidewalk, and there were two other lanes each way. I usually rode on the edge of the second travel lane,
because the parked cars were a safety hazard. It is better to ride predicatably than to weave in and out of a parking lane (although I was screamed at by numerous drivers, many of whom weren't going any faster than I was, for doing this).

I wore a Bell helmet, thank goodness.

On this particular day, a young girl started across the road from the other side of the street on her bicycle, looking for cars but not seeing me. As I was traveling well over 20 miles per hour, my ability to stop was pretty limited. She didn't hear me yell to her, and was right in my path. In
those seconds, or maybe even milliseconds, that you have available to think right before an accident, I weighed my alternatives. Stopping in time was not an option. Moving into the parking lane was not an option, as there was a parked car there. That left: 1) hit the girl, which probably would have
spun us both out into traffic; 2) veer left into traffic, praying that any driver cresting the hill and coming up behind would react in time to miss me; 3) head for the sidewalk, where there happened to be a mailbox in the way.

I choose the sidewalk, moving way to the right to avoid the parked car ahead, reaching the sidewalk...just where the mailbox was. I hit it at high speed, head-first, smashing my glasses in the process because the helmet touched the top of them. I lay on the sidewalk, dazed, bleeding from the
cut above my eye where my eyeglasses broke, until someone called an ambulance and hauled me away.

If it weren't for that helmet, the concussion from the crash might well have been fatal and certainly would have been serious. I ended up badly bruised all over my body from the impact, took several sticthes over my eye, but that was it.

I don't ride that fast downhill anymore. I switched to a helmet that didn't touch the top of my eyeglasses. But I always wear a helmet

I ride 4000 miles a year, do triathlons and duathlons. Did Ironman Canada in 1993. I've crashed twice....both stupidity on my part...and knocked myself out both times. (Broke my collarbone in one of them on RAGBRAI in 93.) I remember nothing about either crash. I was not racing, or going fast, or being reckless. Just nice, normal casual rides. Both times I hit my head hard enough to knock myself out...and I was WEARING a helmet. I can't begin to imagine what would have happened if I hadn't been wearing it.

I would not ride out of my driveway without a helmet. Nor would I allow my grandson to get on his bike, not even for "just a second" without a helmet. It saved my life.

Actually I don't think I would have cracked open my head, had I not been wearing the helmet, because I did not fall that hard. However, about a year ago I was riding slowly through our little town when a car backed out right in front of me. I breaked in time to avoid the car, but I was
cleated to my pedals and could not unhook fast enough to avoid going down. I fell all the way to the pavement and my head hit the sidewalk with a thump. The helmet was only scratched lightly, not dented at all. That is why I don't think it was that hard of a fall. I have purchased a new
helmet, but I prefer to hang on to the old one to lend to friends who don't have one at all. Better a slightly scratched helmet than no helmet at all. Had I not been wearing my helmet that day I'm sure I would have had a headache and a bruised forehead. As it was my arm and leg were the only
casualties and that only surface scratches. Hopes this helps out your project!

On 12/14/99 about 5:45 PM, I was riding east on Main Street in Evanston, just east of Mc Cormack. Without warning, a motorist made a left turn in front of me, although I had a bright light on my bike. I smacked into his right front fender, and flipped onto his hood, headfirst. Fortunately (as I always do), I was wearing my helmet. I was dazed and in shock, but did not lose consciousness. I'm convinced that I would have had significant head injuries and even brain damage had I not been wearing it. As it was, I suffered a broken thumb, and my bike frame was cracked at the head tube. I would be glad to donate my helmet for this project; just let me know the best way to get it to you.

On our tenth anniversary, September 1999, my wife and I had decided to ride in Tsali, NC. We had finished one trail and she was tired. I really wanted to ride some more, so she suggested that she could return in one hour and pick me up. I pointed out that an expert could ride the trail in 45
minutes, but she didn't believe I could do it. We settled on an hour, and parted company.
I was really moving along and having a good time. About 5 miles in, I came a section where the trail become 'vague' for a few yards. I had just decided on my line, when I went over the handlebars. I landed on my face, head and left shoulder.
I felt no immediate pain and stood up. My bike was rideable. My lip (mouth?) was starting to bleed. I washed my face and mouth out with water, and I carefully rode the last two miles of the trail.
When I arrived at the parking lot, I got a stare from another rider. I asked how bad it was and he replied that it needed to get fixed.
My wife took one look at me and said, you need to go to the hospital. There were stitches put in my lip, and lots of question about the possible damage to my head. The doctor gave my wife instructions to watch me for abnormal behavior.
I took it easy the next day, felt woozy once, but can say I have no long term damage...thanks to my brain bucket, which needless to say, did the job it was meant to do. I have since purchased a new one. I will not ride ANYWHERE without one, or ride WITH somebody who doesn't have one. It can happen anytime...

Unfortunately I no longer have the helmet that saved my head, The helmet was a black Bell, but I can relate a story concerning the crash. It happened in August 1987. I was on a tour around Lake Michigan and was on the fifth day of the ride. We started just south of Green Bay, WI and were riding north and up around the upper penisula of MI. We had just entered Traverse City and it was raining very hard. There was a lot of traffic and it was not going slow. I don't know if you know what the road is like in Traverse City, but it has pretty narrow shoulders to ride on and the road is in terrible shape. Between the road and the shoulder there is a seam which at the time was coming apart. I was riding first in the line, there were three of us, and was riding pretty hard because of the rain, we were trying to find somewhere dry. I happened to look in my mirror to see where the other two riders were and my front wheel went into a crack in the pavement and I went head over the handlebars, I think I went head first into the curb at the side of the road. It did not crack the
helmet, but put a big skid mark on the side of it. One of the riders with me said that accident convinced him to wear a helmet at all times. I would like to say that I never, and I mean never, get on a bicycle without my helmet.

First, I was crossing one of the iron bridges across the Sangamon one frosty Feb morning. The car coming the other way didn't stop until he was on the bridge. My front tire slipped on the frosty
steel tire track on the bridge. When I got up I looked at my helmet and found a hexagonal bolthead pattern imprinted where my temple would have been and a slight crack in the foam lining at the back.

I kept using that helmet until, a year later Spring time, when I was riding by Allerton after a thunderstorm which left a small trail of wet silt on the road I didn't see. Just then, I stood
out of the saddle to crank up the speed. ... I hit the ground at about 20 MPH. When I examined the helmet, I could see a crack in the foam lining from one end to the other now.

That's been my helmet experience to date,

Description of Bike Accident in Minneapolis, 18 Jun 1997.

Yesterday I had an accident on my bike. It's really funny because I can't remember at all what happened (or anything else from around, 10am-2pm). I seem to be doing fine now, though.

I left the house sometime close to 10 yesterday to take the car in for repairs, and had my bike in the trunk to then ride into campus. I parked half a block from the garage, to unload the bike,
and in the process lost my car key---it must have fallen off my keyholder. I searched around on the ground for it, and in the trunk, but couldn't find it anywhere, so I decided to bike home and get
the spare key. I tried to remember later what route I might have taken from 37th & Cedar to home, but even driving the different possibilities couldn't bring any of them into my memory.

I must have fallen forward while the bike fell to the left: I have a very sore spot on my lower left ribs, where presumably I hit the corner of the handlebar stem. I'm scraped on the left shoulder, elbow, hip and outer thigh. I also have some scrapes on the inside of that thigh, and the right knee and leg, which I assume are from parts of the bike. The outer layer of fabric on my left shirt
shoulder was completely rubbed away.

As I said I have no recollection of what might have caused the accident, or of being hit or on the ground or anything. I must have picked myself up and gotten home. The bike ended up in
its usual spot, and I had taken off my helmet and gloves in the living room.

At 10:46 (presumably about 10 min after I got home) my friend Sandy, luckily happened to call for me. She recognized immediately that I was confused. Evidently I said "I think I fell on my bike" but wasn't sure where I had been; I kept repeating questions like "Did I call you?". She kept me on the phone for half an hour, then phoned my mom who called me, while Sandy got a coworker
to drive her over to pick me up and take me to the emergency room., I have only slight recollections of these phone conversations, but evidently I was very confused and asking what month it was, etc.
I hadn't figured out how to call the doctor, and evidently had to ask mom what to do when the doorbell rang.

I have no recollection of the drive over (around noon?), or of checking in or getting my temperature and blood pressure checked. Evidently the nurse told an interesting story about the blood pressure machine, which must have gone in one ear and out the other! I guess I still couldn't at this time say what I had had for breakfast, or where I had had dinner the previous night, or things like that.

I think I have full recollections from about 2pm, when I know I had been put in a little curtained examining area, and had a robe to wear. The doctor came in to talk to me, and I successfully
remembered the words "ball, Philadelphia, tree" for five minutes. He said he'd keep me there an hour just to check, and fed me some juice, and a nurse bandaged all my scrapes. I was let go around 3, and I called my colleague Vic Reiner who gave me a ride home (to get a car key) and to my car, which luckily hadn't yet been towed from the "No Parking 4-6" zone. I just took it easy, but didn't sleep too well.

Today I really feel fine, except I'm a little tired, and while driving I thought I felt slightly car sick. I hope that's not a sign of nausea caused by bleeding in the brain, but I think it's just from all the stress
I've been under. My ribs do still hurt quite a bit if I breathe deeply, or sit up from bed or make certain other motions.

I just wish I could know what happened on my bike. I called the police, but the guy I talked to said if they had been called to the scene, they surely would have sent me to the hospital, and that he was on duty yesterday morning but didn't remember anything on the radio about a bike accident. The only damage to the bike is the front wheel being now saddle-shaped, and it seems the left side of the handlebars must have hit ground, as the tape is pockmarked from stones on that side. But there's no sign of damage to my left pannier or pedal. I don't seem to have any wrist pain or scruff marks on my gloves. My helmet seems undamaged, and there's no pain in my neck, but I'm sure glad I was wearing the helmet. I suppose I should get a new helmet now. (And I don't know if I can salvage this wheel.)


WHY EVEN THE PROS SHOULD WEAR HELMETS
Pro roadie Andrei Kivilev, best known for his fourth-place finish in the 2001 Tour de France,
died last week after a crash during the Paris-Nice stage race. The 29-year-old Kazakh cyclist
suffered a fractured skull and lapsed into a coma. He died the next morning.

He was not wearing a helmet. "The injury Andrei sustained on his skull is located at a point
that would have been protected by a helmet," said the Cofidis team physician. "Riders are free
to wear a helmet or not, even though as doctors we would all like to see that it becomes
obligatory." Please, wear a helmet every time you ride. (Thanks to our friends at
RoadBikeRider for this valuable message.) Avoiding a crash in the first place is just as
important as wearing a helmet in the event of one. To improve your riding skills and learn to
ride more safely and with greater confidence, check out the League's BikeEd program.
(From the League of American Bicyclists BikeLeague News dated 3/21/03)

If you've gotten this far, you'll really appreciate this one from Crystal
Waters

GIRLBIKE

Corey Mullens

I began wearing a helmet religiously once I moved into the city. I'm
glad I did. About two years ago I was involved in an accident I don't
think I would have walked away from without a helmet for protection. A
cab made an abrupt left hand turn into my path. I ran into his
passenger side door and flipped over my handlebars and cleared the cab
completely. My feet flipped over my head, and I landed on the back of my
head. Afterwwards, I saw many videos of both motorcyclists and bicyclists
involved in accidents, and this is a very typical flight path. I can't
believe I ever used to ride my bike without a helmet

To continue with more recent stories, click here.