Skip to main content

Cycling obstacles

Four cyclists in Australia found out to their cost that colliding with a dead animal can prove calamitous. The riders were cycling in a group with their club near to Shepparton in Victoria State when they hit a dead kangaroo in the roadway. Some of the riders in the group were able to swerve around the unfortunate creature but others were unable to avoid it, with three suffering injuries that required them to be hospitalised. It is thought that the kangaroo had been struck by a vehicle shortly beforehand. T
August 23, 2016 Read time: 1 min
Four cyclists in Australia found out to their cost that colliding with a dead animal can prove calamitous. The riders were cycling in a group with their club near to Shepparton in Victoria State when they hit a dead kangaroo in the roadway. Some of the riders in the group were able to swerve around the unfortunate creature but others were unable to avoid it, with three suffering injuries that required them to be hospitalised. It is thought that the kangaroo had been struck by a vehicle shortly beforehand. This roadkill vs cyclists incident bears similarities to one in Florida, when a group of six cyclists on a training run skidded on what was left of a dead alligator lying in the roadway.

Related Content

  • Warm asphalt is a hot topic
    June 12, 2012
    Lower temperature mixes – a key advance in bitumen technology - Kristina Smith reports Warm and cold mix asphalts were not on the original agenda for this year’s Eurasphalt & Eurobitume Congress, being held in Istanbul in June. But when the organisers took a look through the papers submitted for their sustainability-themed event, they realised that this is one of the industry’s hottest topics. “We hadn’t quite anticipated the high level of research in this area,” says E&E’s technical programme committee c
  • Poor weather causes traffic chaos
    February 23, 2012
    The recent spate of bad weather conditions across the northern hemisphere has paralysed transport in many countries. In the US, much of northern Europe and parts of China, traffic has ground to a halt as a cold winter has resulted in heavy snowfalls in many areas. Minor roads remained blocked for some time and even major highways were badly affected, with vehicles having to be abandoned until roads could be reopened.
  • Noise needed for quiet cars
    January 9, 2014
    Electric vehicles and hybrids should be fitted with noise emission equipment to reduce danger levels for the blind and partially sighted, according to the European Blind Union (EBU). The EBU is calling on the EU to make noise generators compulsory for all electric and hybrid vehicles due to the obvious risks these pose to blind and partially sighted people. Hybrid vehicles generally run in electric mode when operating at lower speeds in the urban cycle and generate very little engine noise, while electric v
  • Infrastructure stays strong on the road to recovery
    July 1, 2021
    After more than a year of uncertainty, the road industry is coming back stronger than ever before thanks to new ways of working and increased investment – because building new infrastructure lays the foundation for a more resilient and economically robust world.