Not that fast. I did an endo on my mountain bike doing about 20*. I landed on the back of my shoulder and the side of my helmet. I split the helmet and bruised my head through it, bruised my collarbone, and gave myself a bad case of road rash. If I hadn’t been wearing a helmet, I’d probably be dead. If I had hit something that focused the impact better, say a tree or a pole instead of the ground - my head might have fared worse, and the bruised bones would probably be broken ones.
It sounds like he had a collision with another bicyclist, so their speeds relative to each other is probably higher than if he had hit a stationary object, and would provide many opportunities for narrow impact points.
I don’t have any particular love for Bono, but as a fellow cyclist that injured himself, I hope he recovers cleanly from it.
*That’s flat out on a mountain bike, but only pedaling moderately hard on a road bike for most people.
Pretty decent clip but not insane; like scabpicker said, a lot of the time it’s not so much the speed itself but how you handle the fall and into what do you crash. If as reported it happened while dodging some other rider, both going fast, he may not have had a chance to prepare to slide his bike, or to pick where to land (or his front wheel hit something stopping cold and he got catapulted). Depending on where you are in Central Park there may be any number of hard rough surfaces to impact – large rocks, stone walls; metal fencing, drain grates and lamp posts; asphalt or concrete pavement, granite and concrete curbstones, and of course lots and lots of trees. The thorough smashing of his arm and shoulder may (speculation) mean he broke the main force of the impact left arm up, else we’d be talking about the late Bono getting his skull smashed in, not just a fractured orbit. Seems he was riding w/o a helmet (NY only requires them for minors).
[Quote=Dr. Dean Lorich]
On November 16th, Bono was involved in a high energy bicycle accident when he attempted to avoid another rider[…] multiple X-rays and CAT scans showed injuries that include:
Left facial fracture involving the orbit of his eye.
Left scapula (shoulder blade) fracture in three separate pieces.
Left compound distal humerus fracture where the bone of his humerus was driven though his skin and the bone was in six different pieces.He was taken emergently to the operating room for a five-hour surgery Sunday evening where the elbow was washed out and debrided, a nerve trapped in the break was moved and the bone was repaired with three metal plates and 18 screws.
One day later, he had surgery to his left hand to repair a fracture of his 5th metacarpal.
[/quote]
Y’know, I’ve seen a few of the riders in Central Park during my visits that seem to be emulating the NYC Offensive-Driving stereotype, minus the engine. Hope for a full recovery and that he can bring celebrity cred to a Ride Like A Sensible Person campaign.
Bono has done a year-in-review post and indicates that the injury is very serious; not a surprise for six breaks in one arm and a compound fracture (bone sticking out of his leather jacket).
However, he does seem to be trying to keep a sense of humour about it:
He’s known for playing a green Gretsch hollowbody which is a variant on their model the White Falcom that he’s nicknamed the Irish Falcon. He plays a bit of rhythm guitar when they perform but uses it for songwriting and such.
I hope he regains as much functionality as possible…I can’t imagine.
His self-deprecating comment reminds me of what Pete Townshend used to say about Roger Daltrey’s guitar playing way back when. I don’t think Keith is too impressed with Mick’s strumming, either.
Guitarists get territorial, especially when lead vocalists tend to suck all the oxygen out of the room as it is ;). The singers need an instrument for songwriting; beyond that, I don’t worry too much about it.
Keith doesn’t give a shit. I saw them a few weeks ago and Keith was having the time of his life. During Midnight Rambler he was playing in front of Charlie Watts, he blew him a kiss and said, “I love you.”
When Jagger was playing Keith kept right out of his way. They are a band after all.
It’s odd that all the headlines focus on “Bono may never play the guitar again” and totally miss the fact he can’t “move around physically” weeks after the accident.
Having suffered similar levels of injury to my own right arm from a high speed bike crash two days before Christmas, I can testify it’s a real shock to your world being right handed and having your entire right wing taken out of action.
For example, I’m typing left handed as you read this, but your entire work life comes to a halt, you simply can’t work anymore. Simple things like t-shirts, dishwashing and doing up shoe laces are impossible. Sleeping peacefully too is out. But for mine? It’s Bono’s injuries to his hand which are most worrisome. You can recover quit OK from breaks to the clavicle and scapula - both of which I have - and even breaks to your upper arm or wrist heal quite fine. But serious damage to your feet and hands can be problem for you for a lifetime.
In my case I have shattered metacarpals to numbers 3, 4, and 5. That’s some serious hand rehab coming down the pipe and Bono will be no different. I really wish him a full recovery, I know it’s a big concern for me at the moment.
