Accident

As a big walker in Tainan, it was just a matter of time before I saw a traffic accident. Actually I think I saw the end of an accident some time ago, I came across an old man being cared for by two policeman. I speculate that he was knocked down by a hit and run motorcycle and the police were helping him get adjusted. The possibility of catching the perpetrator were nil. The police knew this they just wanted to ease the old man into the reality of the situation.


But recently, I saw the results of an accident before the ambulance/police arrived.
At the Western Gate on Dongmen road the traffic goes around the gate like a traffic circle. There seems to be three lanes about the gate, so negotiating the traffic circle means merging between lanes. Merging doesn't work if you don't look back and motorcyclists rarely use the rear view mirror let alone twist their head and look back. Here two motorcycles are down and so are the motorcyclists maybe they just knocked each other down.

One of the motorcyclists, the one in the red helmet, gets up and hobbles aways.

The other downed motorcyclists waits for the ambulance to take him away. From the way the ambulance workers treated him it looked like he maybe broke a collarbone or an arm. The first ambulance got the action, two other ambulances came by, with "first come first serve" and so they just kept moving.


















The police arrived after the ambulances and commenced to  direct traffic around the two down motorcycles. Both the ambulance people and police seemed very professional, like they were handling an everyday situation.

For me it put a personal impression on what I thought happened often. Now when I heard the ambulance siren I think about the two men lying on the road. It's means somebody is hurting bad maybe more than a trip to hospital can fix. It's not academic, I see a face grimancing in pain.

A few days later I saw another 2 motorcycles down. Some of the smaller alleys aren't wide enough for cars but 2 lanes of motocycles share the alley with walkers and bicycles. In this accident both women seem OK, they were making calls on their cell phones.

















This is an update on 11/28, in the pass two days I have seen the results of two more accidents with motorcycles. In both cases the ambulance took one rider away. Now everytime I hear the ambulance siren I think of these accidents. This one was on Siaodong Road a few blocks from school. A motorcycle hit a car, probably a car making a left hand turn and the motorcycle going straight.

This morning I saw another accident this one between two motorcyclists. One ambulance and 3 police cars. It looked like one of the cyclists had broken bones.

I was thinking about renting a motorcycle during the break between classes but I think now I'll just ride all the bus routes in Tainan instead.