An amateur motorcyclist escaped with relatively minor injuries after a spectacular crash on Saturday morning.
West Vancouver police say the 25-year-old Burnaby man was riding east on Highway 1 around 8:15 a.m. when he lost control of the bike and collided with the centre median between Taylor Way and Capilano Road..
“The motorcycle actually ended up going over the barricade and into the oncoming lane but the rider mercifully … stayed in his lane,” said Const. Jeff Palmer, West Vancouver police spokesman. “The rider fell off the motorcycle and was thrown approximately 100 metres.”
But the carnage wasn’t done there. A westbound driver on the other side of the highway swerved to avoid the crumpled motorcycle barreling towards him and crashed his vehicle into the right barrier.
The biker suffered fairly significant road rash and possible further hand injuries from the fall and skid to a stop while the westbound driver was taken to hospital as a precautionary measure.
The Kawasaki sports bike left a trail of debris down the highway.
Palmer attributed the crash to the young rider wanting to partake in an age-old piece of bike culture meant to show camaraderie between riders — the wave.
“It doesn’t appear that speed was factor. It appeared to be possibly rider inexperience,” he said. “He took one hand off the bars to wave at a motorcyclist passing in the opposite direction and apparently that initiated a bit of a wobble on the motorcycle, which he couldn’t regain control of.”
The rider received a violation ticket for driving contrary to the restrictions of his learner’s licence, which requires that that a qualified supervisor be in eyeshot.
