Does anyone know Iowa599 over on the 599 forum?

Iowa599 rider, bad accident - Honda 599 Forum

According to his wife, he got in a bad accident yesterday without his helmet on, and has suffered brain injuries and the loss of part of an ear.

FOR GOD'S SAKE WEAR A HELMET!!!!!!!!!

Speedy recovery Iowa599.

All the best to Iowa599.

I hope this guy recovers fully and rides again, never without a helmet.

I took a spill yesterday on a bicycle at speed and did a two-point landing - my head and left arm took almost all of the impact. It was enough to knock me out briefly then and four hours later at which time my wife dragged me to the ER. I have three broken ribs but no concussion. I had a pulse of 42 at the ER but that gradually went up. They pumped me up with narcotics and sent me home. Had I not been wearing a helmet I certainly would have had some cranial damage.

Helmets work.

Best wishes for a speedy and full recovery to Iowa599

+1

Thats awful. Get well soon. Just remember guys if he had his helmet on, he may be going home to his wife. Your no hero not wearing a helmet and it doesnt look cool or tough.

Four years ago my lovely wife slipped on a wet marble floor and broke her patella into 5 pieces - put her in a wheelchair/crutches for six months. And she wasn't even riding! This strengthened my resolve to ride 100% ATGATT head to toe.

Best wishes for Iowa and his family...(prayers)


Why in the fuck anyone would get on any bike with anything less than a full face is beyond me!!!

Im a little stunned. Here its illegal to ride without one. I would never think to ride without. And as I mentor new riders we really push AGATT.

I hope he recovers well.

Best wishes to the fallen rider for a full recovery.

Best wishes to his family and loved ones in these tough times.

Heard a little more about this accident. I heard that Iowa599 was stopped at an intersection, and a Lincoln Navigator hit him from behind. The Lincoln driver didn't stop in time because a water bottle had rolled up under the brake pedal.

Loose items rolling around! What a careless waste.

Best wishes for a speedy recovery.

F* man, that just makes it worse. I hope he recovers alright and the insurance covers all cost.

Careful out there guys, keep her in 1st at the light on busy streets. Have an optimal escape plan and watch those mirrors!

ABSOLUTELY! Assume the driver behind you doesnt see you, and BOLO at at all times. Watch for the car BEHIND the car behind you also, they may decide to try to pass and take your lane.

Yeah, I always leave the bike in 1st (never neural) and flash the brake light and keep an eye on the mirror and an eye on cross traffic in case I have to jump. Yesterday I watched a girl on her cell phone pull out in front of me - didn't even see me until I started waving my hi-viz arm at her. All she could do was nail it to get out of my way. I do a little wobble dance when approaching someone who could turn in front of me. Sometimes it gets their attention.

I do the same thing when someone is following me too close for comfort.

Wobble dance!!??

Damn my first bike was a 599, I posted on there for a while but I haven't seen this thread.

Prayers sent, and a speedy recovery!

^^^this. I was very lucky with my accident which was extremely similar. Had I not been wearing a helmet I woulda been FOOOOOKED

Ouch. Hope the guy gets better and the brain damage isn't significant or life-impacting.

You know how NASCAR or other race series drivers weave back and forth to keep their tires clean and warmed up when they have to trundle along behind a safety car? That, only in the confine of one lane and with a motorcycle.

The rapid oscillating motion (if done right) does often get people's attention - right from the OMGPREDATORFIGHTORFLIGHT part of the hindbrain. It is remarkably effective.

Ohhhhhh............I do that all the time! mainly when I'm stuck behind a line of cars too long to pass, I get bored...

Exactly.

You know that moment when you see a driver who could pull out or turn left in front of you? That's when I give the bike a jiggle. I liken it to the oscillating headlight of an approaching locomotive. Or maybe they just think I'm crazy and stay out of my way.

I've also found that cheesy quote "loud pipes save lives" is generally quite true and most effective with critters and soccer moms

Loud pipes - not so much. Noise is easily blocked out and can be disorienting to motorists who don't see you. Loud pipes are most effective at instilling hate and rage in the general public at all riders. That doesn't help us. Remember, non-riders don't distinguish between different types of "bikers" so we all get lumped in with those assholes who sit outside the bar revving their hogs just to set off car alarms.

IMHO flashing light and irratic motion is the best way to get noticed at an intersection.

I will roll from inside to outside of my lane ( I suppose this is the wobble dance ) so the drivers can "pick up" my movement and better judge spatial distance and speed of me closing on them. I also suppose it makes them wonder if I'm a bit crazy, out of control, or if it only makes them stall in their decision process for a second longer and wait to SEE what the heck it is I'm doing. FOR WHATEVER REASON, I think it works a bit to gain drivers attention also.

I also make a point to do that a bit in intersections where I think someone may turn from a sidestreet into my lane, or cross from oncoming lane - etc.

Yes, but in your case that's because you put the bike together wrong and it wobbles at lower speeds anyway, Mister "I Put My Tire On Backwards And Now I'm Wondering Why It Wears And Handles Like Crap." :P

No, it's not. All it does is annoy everyone behind you and in your wake. The people ahead of you (you know, the ones you're most worried about) cannot hear you well enough for that to matter. And for that matter, many recent cars have good enough sound insulation that they cannot hear you at all.

Loud pipes = you're an asshole who wants to get the police cracking down on motorcyclists and are supporting an eventual ban on bikers. You are also an idiot because you are slowly deafening yourself and you have made your machine so loud you can't hear the sound of something going wrong early enough that it doesn't become catastrophic. Like, say, the screaming tires of the guy desperately trying to stop before he rams into you.

Yikes! WhipBashing!

"you" in CB's post doesn't = you, Whip. You = loud pipe riders in general.

So since Whip has loud pipes... :whistl ing:

Hey I didn't mention any names.

LOL! is all good Ken I'm just funnin.....whippy has had to develope some thick skin with riding an XB

I enjoy a little noise, but not the "Blat" of open shorty header that just sounds like shit, but loud done in a tasteful way is just fun...

My case in point comes from when I first got my Drz, the stock exhaust was...well stock exhaust quiet and I had many close calls with the critters around here, one where I actually ducked under a cow elks chin her neck brushed my shoulder as I passed, between the deer and elk the 7mi between my house and town is a serious obstacle course during the fall and winter months...I installed a DG pipe that would drown out most harleys and the critters disappeared...now the Drz was way too loud and I don't want that for my XB but it is capable of a big thundering sound...I will give it that sound for my satisfaction and saftey...then maybe I'll come visit ya someday, you'll be able to hear the once I cross the Rockies!

Btw! My dads name is Ken

Mfive, have you heard anything about how Iowa is doing?

Check the thread link in the original post. His wife has been posting updates.

From his wife:

Damn! Prayin for the guy for sure!...... You can do it Iowa! Hang in there bud!

Hey guys, I'm Mrs. Iowa599. Didn't even realize you'd heard about his accident til just now, I've had a lot on my plate but I'll try to keep y'all updated along with the 599 forum. In brief, there was a stopped car trying to make a left turn, and stopped behind it were a Kia Sedona and my husband's motorcycle. The approaching Navigator (and I don't care why she didn't stop, it's sort of irrelevant because there's no excuse) hit his motorcycle hard enough to pin him in place between the folded-up seat and the gas tank as she pushed the motorcycle for 24 feet into the back of the Sedona. At about the 18 foot mark is where he fell off into the road, landing pretty much head first.

First I wanna say something about the helmet bit. He religiously wore his helmet - in fact, that was part of our wedding vows that we'd both always wear our helmets. Occasionally one of us would forget - or 'forget' - and the other one would say "Take your helmet, stupid"...unfortunately, the day before his accident I was actually admitted as an inpatient to another area hospital (acute pancreatitis) and wasn't scheduled to be discharged for another day or two, so I wasn't there to remind him when he set off to work that day. The call came about 3 hours after the accident; I got myself discharged (against medical advice of course but that was the last thing I cared about right then) and rushed to the trauma center, assuming he'd been wearing it and maybe forgot to fasten it or something.

It wasn't til three days later, when I went home for the first time, that I saw his helmet on the stand and realized fully he'd gotten on his bike without it. I spent the next half hour hugging his helmet, crying and wondering why it wasn't on his head. Three other motorcycle accident patients came and went in the ICU with physical injuries on their bodies very similar to his while I was waiting and hoping he'd open his eyes, because they were all wearing theirs.

On the flip side of that, it's probably easier in Florida than any other state to justify not wearing a helmet to yourself if you don't have someone to remind you that's not an option, simply because it's so bloody hot and there's so many mistimed traffic lights that you spend half the time on an average ride stopped in traffic baking in the sun and humidity. Again, he almost always wore his helmet, and the one day he didn't is when this happened.

In addition, the trauma ER surgeon who saved his life told me that due to the way he'd fallen, it's highly likely that if he had been wearing his helmet he'd be paralyzed or dead because his neck would have probably snapped. This obviously does not justify NOT wearing a helmet, and I'm certainly not going to pass that bit of information on to him once he's recovered enough to ask questions, yet I'm pretty sure if his brain was fine but he was paralyzed from the neck down, he'd probably rather be dead. The force of the impact also actually sheared off a bit of his skull, allowing the blood and brain swelling an outlet rather than building up pressure inside his skull to cause more damage.

Now for the latest news: as of right now he's been off the ventilator completely for 24 hours. There's still a tube in his trachea to keep his airway open in case he chokes or something or they need to put the vent back on, but so far so good, which means his lung is healing really well from having been collapsed. It does prevent him from talking, but he certainly moves his mouth as if he's trying to talk.

The lacerated kidney is also healing just fine, and the one tiny bit of road rash he got is already healed. His groin region - sorry guys, you might not want to read this sentence - was fairly badly bruised because he was pinned between seat and gas tank; it too is healing and at about the same rate as the bruise all along his left side where the kidney and lung injuries occurred.

His right eye has healed amazingly. At first the surrounding tissue was swollen to about the size of a tennis ball and the darkest purple I've ever seen on tissue that was still alive. It took about a week and a half for enough blood to drain out of the area for him to have a regular black eye, but the swelling is now all gone and just a bit of the bruising remains. The staples in his head wound were removed half on Thursday and the other half Friday, and the sutures across and behind his ear have been cut but not taken out yet; the plastic surgeon for his ear did a really good job, he's got a bit of a Vulcan tip to that ear and it's going to be a bit lumpy at the scar, but neither scar is disfiguring at all or gross to look at. Just sort of scary when I think what he must have looked like when the ambulance first pulled up.

The brain swelling was gone almost completely 24 hours after the accident - again due in part to the fact that a piece of his skull was already missing so the surgeons didn't have to take one out, just sew him back up. However, his brain was seriously traumatized (obviously) so it's going to be a long haul with lots of rehab and physical therapy, and until the inpatient rehab process starts - and it can't until the trach tube, catheter and feeding tube (which is directly in his stomach as of yesterday) are out - there's no way to have any idea what sort of short term and long term issues the accident's caused in his brain. His eyes open, every day they focus a little more in tandem; he watches TV and certainly seems to recognize his parents and myself to the point of shrugging or raising his eyebrows in response to things we say, and is a great deal more likely to do something one of us asks him to do than if a doctor or nurse asks.

When assisted to a sitting position on the edge of the bed by the physical therapists, his muscle control is good enough that he positions his feet and weight correctly on the floor. He can only keep his head lifted for a couple of seconds and he tends to list heavily to the left, but he responds to that by trying to brace himself on that side with his hand on the bed so he clearly knows that he's leaning and he's trying to compensate, which is really good. Standing requires pretty complete support on all sides, but again, he positions his legs and weight on them correctly and if a foot is nudged he'll move it a half step in the indicated direction.

That's the latest and, as I said, I'll start updating this thread as well as the other. Don't worry, I certainly haven't given up riding my 919 and I doubt my husband will stop riding either once he's healed enough to do so. Thanks for the support and thoughts, wear your helmet for my sake if not for your own, and ride safe.

PS If you want the link to the post-accident pics of the 599, just let me know.

Happy to hear there's some positive progress

+1!


And to add, we can get preachy about helmets and learn from mistakes but I think everyone will agree that we wish your husband a full and fast recovery.

Please keep us informed.