News Forum - Cyclist unable to take steep hill plunges to his death in Chiang Mai ravine

[Thaiger]

A cyclist riding in Chiang Mai, a northern Thai province, was unable to steer his bike down a downhill road yesterday morning and plummeted about 30 metres down a ravine to his death. Police learned of the incident, which occurred on a steep section of the Mae Rim-Mae Sai tourist road in front of the Pongyang Jungle Coaster & Zipline attraction, around 11am. Police say the 34 year old Kritsuphan Khanchai wrestled with the downhill bend before striking a guardrail and plunging about the length of a 10 story building into a ravine below. The Bangkok Post says it took […]

The post Cyclist unable to take steep hill plunges to his death in Chiang Mai ravine appeared first on Thaiger News.

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[Stonker]

RIP.

Cyclists round me regularly go up and down the hills up here which are dangerously steep and there's no way they can brake safely, even with disc brakes, as it's hard to go much less than 70 or 80 kph coming down.

I recall coming down out of the Redwoods in California on a touring tandem at over 120kph, with both rim and drum brakes front and rear, and the front tyre blew from the heat.

Not funny.

 

[DiJoDavO]

1 hour ago, Stonker said:

RIP.

Cyclists round me regularly go up and down the hills up here which are dangerously steep and there's no way they can brake safely, even with disc brakes, as it's hard to go much less than 70 or 80 kph coming down.

I recall coming down out of the Redwoods in California on a touring tandem at over 120kph, with both rim and drum brakes front and rear, and the front tyre blew from the heat.

Not funny.

If you do your best keeping attention to the brakes and go slowly from the moment you go down, you should be able to go down safely, right? 

I've been in a situation that I went down and realized that my brakes failed. Luckily it was a straight road down. But I couldn't do much but wait until I was down. 

Ever since, I just keep it safe and just hold my brakes enough to go down with an acceptable speed. 

[HolyCowCm]

Does this count as a vehicle accident fatality? 

[Stonker]

1 hour ago, DiJoDavO said:

If you do your best keeping attention to the brakes and go slowly from the moment you go down, you should be able to go down safely, right? 

No - that's the problem.

Like the road where he came off these are narrow roads with a hill on one side and a steep drop on the other, and you can't just "crawl" down the road steadily applying the brakes as you'll be in the way of any other vehicles also going down, so you have a choice of either speeding up or getting squashed from behind  -  or, if you swing too wide, going into a bus or truck coming up on a bend.

It's not so bad when it's a Honda Wave coasting down the hill behind you, engine off to save petrol, but when it's a 60 seat tour bus or a double sugar cane truck, fully loaded, and they've got no brake servo or power steering because they've also turned off the engine to save fuel, you need to move out of the way.

Not many are quite that stupid but some are, and accidents aren't that unusual as brakes, engines or drivers fail.

[Bob20]

1 hour ago, HolyCowCm said:

Does this count as a vehicle accident fatality? 

Not if he tests positive for Covid

[miblish51]

Events like this, while certainly tragic, aren't really significant news stories. Do you really have nothing more important about Thailand to report? Or is this just an easy story, rewriting a press release and adding a stock photo of a road?

[HolyCowCm]

12 hours ago, Bob20 said:

Not if he tests positive for Covid

Yeah but even so they will alter cause of death to be something else and say the guy had 2 Sinovac shots and was protected already. 

[HiuMak]

15 hours ago, Stonker said:

RIP.

Cyclists round me regularly go up and down the hills up here which are dangerously steep and there's no way they can brake safely, even with disc brakes, as it's hard to go much less than 70 or 80 kph coming down.

I recall coming down out of the Redwoods in California on a touring tandem at over 120kph, with both rim and drum brakes front and rear, and the front tyre blew from the heat.

Not funny.

Not all roads are made equal and some are more dangerous than others. Road builders sometimes do not consider/plan all safety aspects when building.  This could be one of them with a steep gradient. Worst case for cyclist, dismount and push the bike down if feels unsafe. This can also be dangerous for motorcycles?

[Russellprout]

8 hours ago, miblish51 said:

Events like this, while certainly tragic, aren't really significant news stories. Do you really have nothing more important about Thailand to report? Or is this just an easy story, rewriting a press release and adding a stock photo of a road?

To be honest as a cyclist I am more interested in this story than I am in all the media reports on BIB braking up another drinks party, but I dont complain I see the headline and move on to the next story.

[Stonker]

1 hour ago, HiuMak said:

This can also be dangerous for motorcycles?

We live a few hundred metres beyond the bottom of the hill, where the road flattens out and those who've "coasted" down up to 10 kms bump start their motorbikes - unless they've run out of petrol, which isn't that unusual.

On average there have been one or two killed in road accidents within two hundred metres of us every year, with the worst being a bus that turned over killing four and injuring forty (some may have died of their injuries later) a couple of years ago - not the first.

Cyclists still go up and down every day.

[Zool]

12 hours ago, miblish51 said:

Events like this, while certainly tragic, aren't really significant news stories. Do you really have nothing more important about Thailand to report? Or is this just an easy story, rewriting a press release and adding a stock photo of a road?

I beg to differ. This story can serve as a reminder to us readers to be more careful on the steep hills when biking.

[gummy]

15 minutes ago, Zool said:

I beg to differ. This story can serve as a reminder to us readers to be more careful on the steep hills when biking.

One would have that that the cyclist would have known of the dangers and cycled with more caution, or else Thai cyclists are just as bad as Thai pick-up drivers.

[MrStretch]

I've been thinking how terrifying that must have been...downhill, rapidly accelerating with insufficient brakes and going out of control.

A terrible way to go...knowing that you are going to die and there is little you can do to change that fact.

[Bob20]

8 minutes ago, MrStretch said:

I've been thinking how terrifying that must have been...downhill, rapidly accelerating with insufficient brakes and going out of control.

A terrible way to go...knowing that you are going to die and there is little you can do to change that fact.

A bit like when you can't breath and they put you out to connect you to a respirator, knowing you have little chance to wake up again...

And that 5 million times!

And then still people say "let's get back to normal and never mind if that happens to more people unnecessarily, as long as I can have my weekend break or open my shop tomorrow again"

[Stonker]

2 hours ago, gummy said:

One would have that that the cyclist would have known of the dangers and cycled with more caution, or else Thai cyclists are just as bad as Thai pick-up drivers.

Impossible to say, but there are a lot of "new" cyclists around everywhere, in part thanks to Covid.

In the UK, despite less cars on the road, cycling fatalities were up 40% last year and fatalities doubled during lockdowns.

 

[Scotty]

RIP mate.  I have ridden many Thailand mountains and they can be steep and dangerous.  I used to use Strava app to try and beat my time or beat someone else, crazy. Condolences to his family and friends.