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sThe Dirty Old Pig is badly damaged and may have finished his career as a motorbike.Sadly after 22 years ownership and nearly 240,000ks and an overall career of 315,000ks he may have to be scrapped because of the damage he sustained when my mate Dennis ploughed into us on his BMW.
{See Dennis in Stator's Travel story on page21}.
I was knocked out when Dennis hit us so this story is based on what the eye witness,my old mate Clive told me,what the photos showed and what the trail of broken parts indicated.Our normal short ride is 140ks of all the roads in the district which have corners but as there was a drug fuelled Music Festival being held down by the Murray River,which meant the area was flooded with cops,we decided just to cruise over to Yarrawonga for a coffee.We pulled out of the Finley BP at 10 O'clock and by 12 O'clock I was unconscious in the Shepparton Hospital having all sorts of scans.Dennis was in a more serious trouble,which he deserved,and wastransferred to Melbourne.
The left hand photo is where we came from.The middle is the farm front gate.The right is where we were headed.
The following is what we have pieced together to explain what happened.We had travelled 2ks eastward along Carramar Rd. Boomanoomanah which is a long,straight,narrow bitumen road when I saw an old mate Clive pull out of the Carramar Farm driveway in his old VW Beetle heading west.I braked to pull for a chat with Clive who also pulled over and stopped.Sadly,Dennis kept his eyes on Clive and didn't realise I had braked.Dennis was travelling at 100kph and sitting too close behind me and Clive reckons I was nearly stopped,so we hit with a big whack.
The mark in the gravel is probably where we hit.
I got sent home from hospital to allow the swelling to subside before they could operate and took the opportunity to go and get The Pig and to see what condition he was in and to work out what happened.My mate Bub came with me and the first parts he found were 2 Bmw rocker arms and smashed pieces of the rocker box cover and that rocker box must be immensely strong based on the carnage it inflicted.It's first victim was my Supertrapp muffler.It's new nickname is Pretzel.Next it broke the caliper mount and then ripped the shocker in half and dragged it out of the swingarm.
Finally it got to the frame and reshaped it to the shape of a BMW rocker box.It appears that The Pig's frame was strong enough to absorb most of the force and the BMW shot off to the other side of the road and ended up 30mts away against the fence.
I must have been thrown over the bars because I landed on my head,my right shoulder and my ribs.My right leg is broken,which I consider lucky because if the BMW had been 2 inches to the right the only thing in it's path would have been my right leg and that would have been very nasty.It may have been the rocker box that broke my right because my right boot was torn off as well.I only ended up with about 6sq inches of gravel rash which is amazing as I was only wearing a T-shirt at the time and I landed right in the middle of the gravel driveway.Apologies to the ATGATT crowd for not agreeing BUT I was very lucky not to lose any more skin.I have a mark on my helmet just above the visor and the visor is gone so that probably explains being knocked out.
Dennis came out worse on all fronts.The motor took a massive whack and I imagine it will have some major damage.When Clive moved the BMW it would only steer in one direction,so either the frame or that stupid front end are knackered.One brake caliper was torn off completely.Sadly the bike wasn't insured,not it was too expensive but because he normally rides so slowly he can drag his feet along the ground to stop so he doesn't need insurance.He was taken to Melbourne because he had a couple of bones poking out the back of his left hand,which had pins put in them and also had 2 spiral fractures in his right ankle plated and screwed.
Sadly,this wasn't an accident.It was caused by Dennis riding too close behind me to be able to react to a situation.He doesn't know Clive or his Beetle so he wouldn't have been expecting me to stop but had he been 100mts behind me it wouldn't have mattered.I think in future I'll ride tail end Charlie in future and let them worry about me.
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