“These are people who left their families who are waiting for them to come home.”
That’s from local cyclist Ron Gallo when speaking on Monday’s scary hit and run in Prince George that injured a pair of Cops for Cancer Tour de North riders, one of which is an RCMP officer.
Gallo told MyPGNow.com both riders were taking part in a training session that likely began a few hours earlier.
“These two gentlemen that were on their bikes yesterday probably left their house according to the data that I have seen at about six o’clock in the morning and had already put on 90 kilometres at the time of the incident.”
While on scene, Gallo recognized one of the victims had a radar detector to help spot oncoming traffic but it wasn’t enough to prevent the unthinkable.
“It notifies the cyclist with an audible noise that something is approaching them from behind. It displays a dot on the bike computer screen and the dot travels up that screen until it gets to the top and that is when the motorist with the vehicle that is behind is supposed to go by.” said Gallo.
“When we see this and we are in a group we always call out ‘car back’ – with the riders moving to the far right as quickly as they can. It is pretty evident when you look at the accident scene they did this but there bikes were hit and pushed over the curb at the time of impact.”
Gallo, who has ridden with groups like the Wheelin’ Warriors of the North, knows all too well the dangers that exist for bike riders in our city.
“When you are riding northbound and you get hit by a vehicle travelling northbound entering the bike lane there is absolutely nothing you can do and you will not win that battle.”
“We have some situations in Prince George where bike lanes disappear, re-appear and then shoulders are there and not there. We do have confusion about what the different markings on the road mean when it comes to sharing the road with motorists and cyclists.”
“I do have opportunities to ride online with a large cycling community around the world, more and more cyclists are getting disillusioned about the idea that they will return home if they ride outside on the road,” added Gallo.
One suspect who was driving a black dodge 1500 truck was taken into custody.
The Tour de North rides is scheduled for September 12th to 18th consisting of an 850-kilometre journey from PG to Prince Rupert raising money for childhood cancer research.
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