20 cm from Death

I had an incident when cycling on the 1st March 2010 which I didn't post here on my blog.

Here is my initial reaction to the incident which I posted on Cyclechat a few hours afterwards (including the original typos).

I'm still a bit shaken. This morning I was entering a roundabout at about 15 mph. Nothing else was on the roundabout at the time. I am going straight on. On the next entrance to the roundabout a HGV (oil tanker) is approaching. We make eye contact and he starts slowing. The next thing I know he is entering the roundabout and he is turning right (cutting straight across me). I can't go ahead of him, I can't go behind him. I brake hard, and my back wheel looses grip (sub zero this morning). I manage to stay upright (thank God!) and stop just short of him. He continues to tun and due to his size his rear wheels get closer and closer to me. The pass less than 20cm from me and my bike. He disappears off leaving me stood in the middle of the roundabout in complete shock.

When I get to the meeting I was going to they commented that I looked white.

So I'm just having something to eat, I'll be phoning the police (I have the reg but no markings on the tanker) and then I'll get the video up.

I honestly thought my time was up.

Days before this, I had upgraded my brake pads. I know for a fact if I had not I would have been 1m further along the road.....

It was a serious incident, one which I took straight to the police. After a little 'encouragement' from myself they were happy to charge the driver with Dangerous Driving. In Scotland this means the case is referred to the Procurator Fiscal (PF) who decide on what action to take, i.e. to take it to court or to drop the charges.

It has taken a good few months to find out from the PF what has happened to my case (that's another story), however, yesterday I found out.




Insufficient evidence.

So what do you think?