A 58-year-old woman motorcycle passenger remained in hospital in critical condition Monday after a crash on the Malahat that killed the 53-year-old male driver.
Witnesses said they saw the motorcycle weaving in and out of traffic in the minutes leading up to the crash on Saturday.
Lisa Leeson and her sister were driving northbound toward Shawnigan Lake when she heard a motorcycle coming up behind her. Leeson was in the left lane and she saw the motorcycle pass on her left, quite close to her driver’s side mirror. The motorcycle then crossed the left lane and drove between two cars.
Leeson said she was driving about 80 to 90 kilometres an hour and the motorcycle passed her quickly.
“I said, ‘Oh my God, what is he doing?’ ” she recalled. “I said to my sister: ‘He’s going to crash.’ ”
A minute later, Leeson saw the crashed motorcycle. It had struck the cement barrier on the right side of the highway near Okotoks Road.
Leeson ran up to the man, who was so injured she was sure he wouldn’t survive. Several drivers stopped to help but there was little they could do to treat the injuries until West Shore RCMP and B.C. Ambulance paramedics arrived. “I was in shock,” Leeson said. “I looked at both of them and realized there was nothing I could do and I just froze.”
Several drivers wrote on social media that they saw the motorcycle swerving between and around cars in the left and right lanes. Other witnesses told Leeson they thought the motorcycle was going to hit her because he was tailgating her car.
“It was unbelievable. I’m still shaking,” Leeson said.
The man was pronounced dead at the scene. The female passenger was taken to hospital with life-threatening injuries. Both are from Vancouver Island, RCMP said.
The northbound lanes of the highway were closed for several hours between Okotoks and Aspen roads while officers, including an RCMP traffic reconstructionist, investigated. The highway reopened at 6:50 p.m.
The cause of the collision is under investigation.
