Read the article, then read the comments. It’s fairly obvious that these people didn’t:
This is so sad, when are they going to own up and tell the public these scooters are not safe on the roads or charging the batteries up at home. Ban them for good.
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The police need to act on these thing and take them off the roads!
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Get these scooters off the road!!! And banned!!!
If these idiots had not only read the article, but looked at the pictures if the words were too long, they would realise that this wasn’t an E scooter, it was one of the small Honda C90/Cub type bikes. A small motorcycle with a semi-automatic transmission. Not an E scooter. In fact, not a scooter at all.
Mind you, the guy was supposedly telling others about road safety yet is pictured pulling wheelies while riding in T shirt and shorts. I make no further comment on that. The accident investigation is still ongoing, but emergency vehicles on blues and twos are likely to be breaking road traffic rules, so are in deep trouble if that was the cause. From the images, it looks as if the ambulance was emerging onto a major road, so a SMIDSY is a possibility here.
In this case it’s a seperate issue but isn’t using a small electric scooter on a public road illegal already?
Mostly. There are the legal trial ones, but outside that, yes.
Odd that all through the article, his bike is referred to as a scooter. They were called a step thru when I was young. (And I’m amazed at how much they’re selling for on ebay, as well).
The accident happened at 10.25 pm. The photo of him pulling a wheelie is in daylight so may have been taken months ago so you cannot infer that this is what he was riding when he was killed.
The Mail would have picked up the story from the local media which refers to a scooter. It probably was a scooter but not an e-scooter; maybe a Lambretta type or even something bigger like a Burgman. He was a member of a scooter club after all.
I neither said, nor inferred anything of the sort. I stated that someone who does this is not someone whose opinion on road safety is one I would take seriously. I made no mention of what he was or may have been wearing on the night of the incident.
The other bikes shown stopped at the incident were the same type of Honda Cub/C90/C50 that was shown in the wheelie picture, so not a scooter, a motorcycle, albeit a horrible one as Stony mentions below.
The Honda C50 is the best selling vehicle of all time. For providing cheap reliable transport they are just brilliant. But they really are bloody awful things to ride. The clunky gear change, the soggy suspension and awful handling, the leg shields that look really useful but provide no actual weather protection, the list of dreadfulness is endless. I hated mine and couldn’t wait to be rid of it and move up to something less unpleasant.
I’ve never understood their appeal. They are terrible things, horrible to ride and I am pleased to say that I have never owned one and never will.
I agree with (what used to be) the rule in South Africa. An Emergency vehicle with visible and audible warnings engaged had absolute right of way. Not hearing/seeing the emergency vehicle was no defence. Whether this still applies in the Rainbow Nation I don’t know.