Ralph Cherry Jr., 23, was riding west in the bike lane of Davison Drive in Antioch about 11 a.m. Tuesday when he was hit by an SUV driven by the girl, Antioch police said.I hate it that we live in a country where you can kill a cyclist and then just say "Accident" and all is OK.
The girl was driving on a learner's permit with her grandfather, who has a license, police said. For reasons that have not yet been determined, the girl lost control of the SUV and struck Cherry, authorities said.
Cherry was flown by helicopter to John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek, where he died at 5:20 p.m. Wednesday, the Contra Costa County coroner's office said.
In my recent memory we've had a man mow down a cyclist who was waiting at a light in Walnut Creek-- nothing happened
A deputy plow through cyclists -- nothing happened
Now this.
I'm even more rattled because it's just a couple of miles from my house. I ride that road often. I may have been on that road that very day. My wife crosses it every day on her (bike) commute. I'm finely getting our daughter to ride to Los Medanos College for her classes.
I read the comments in SF Gate. It's just depressing. Ralph Cherry and his family get very little love and respect. Instead I'm reading:
- Accident, oh well...
- What do cyclists expect, clogging up the road and all...
- The driver will carry this her whole life (like that makes it OK)
I'll stop ranting now. I'm just really upset.
Jesus! How the HELL do you hit a bicyclist? I mean, how bad of a driver do you have to be? This is totally unacceptable, I mean, I never hit anyone when I was learning how to drive, my dad never hit anything when he was learning how to drive, my mother, my sister, my grandparents, no one. I've never met anyone who, in their prime, had hit anything. An accident is a fender bender where a laps of judgment or a moment of inattentiveness happens and you tag someone's bumper. But how in God's name do you lose control of a vehicle that isn't going very fast at all and you can't put two and two together and find the break pedal?!
ReplyDeleteWhen I drive my car, I see these utterly horrible drivers all the time. In fact, just today I nearly got ran off the road by this 20 something girl in an SUV twice the size of my El Camino. What was she doing? Talking to her stupid friend while changing lanes and not looking! I've had people cut me off, change into my lane on the freeway, forget to break until the last minute, I mean, where are these people getting their driver's licenses? A cracker jack box?
This is just another reason why it should be harder to get a drivers license. Some people are just not equipped to drive responsibly and safely. People think that driving is a right when actually, it is a privilege. If you are ill equipped to drive then sorry, I don't want to hear your sob story, you don't drive.
Just Unbelievable. As if I felt comfortable out on the road on my bike as it is, now I have to hear that another cyclist, this one only 2 years older than me, got creamed by yet another SUV. It's sickening...