Odds of Dying in a Bicycle Crash

Published by Matt Polaine | Filed under Bicycle, Cars, Cycling, Cycling infrastructure, Motorcycles

credit: cozy beehive, edited by vision2020

Over the course of your life, it may be safer to ride a bicycle than to be a pedestrian! However, this is due to exposure to the risk. We walk more than cycle.

But the chances of dying in a bicycling accident is apparently more than that of going down in an airplane.

This interesting graphic interpretation from risk of death showed up on the Pixdaus blog. Any H&S official should take note of this, as I often come across so-called ‘risk assessments’ that are very poorly determined.

1 in 4,919 (0.02%) is a lifetime probability that means that out of every 4,919 instances of equivilant exposure to the said risk when riding your bicycle, 1 instance can result in death. There is complex data hidden in here, because it hides ‘per kilometres exposure’, exposure meaning life lived as well as during of event.

For example, we all die eventually (1 in 1) but the cause of death being heart disease across the global population is 1 in 5. We all have 100% exposure as we all have hearts. However death from heart disease in ages 0-25 will have much higher odds - the exposure to heart disease odds has to be across 100% of your life.

According to this website, this data was provided by the National Safety Council.

But referring to the NSC’s website itself, that number seems more like 1 in 4,098 (2005). Interestingly, we are named ‘Pedalcyclists’. I’ve never seen that before. Is there any other form of cycling other than pedaling? I guess you could technically ‘cycle’ drugs and steroids too but…

Anyway, so is this picture reflecting new data?

Bicycle death statistics can have various facets as an article on the CICLE blog says. It is suffice to say that riders who don’t follow the rules will die much earlier than the rest.

The general picture though, relative to other terrestrial modes of transportation, is not all that bad. I wonder how it varies from geographical locations, age and application (road vs mountain biking vs bmx). Remember, data also changes from year to year.

The bottom line though is this; cycling is healthy, and the odds of you dying from obesogenic disorders is far far higher (1 in 24 to 1 in 5) than riding a bicycle (1 in 4,919), and yet exercising while riding can help reduce your very bad odds of dying from these disorders.

If anyone tells you cycling is dangerous, tell them you are roughly a thousand times more likely to die from not exercising and sitting around in a car or in front of a TV/PC all day than riding a bicycle…

Read more about risks of cycling in the UK.