One Friday morning about 9:00 AM, heading west on I-10 near Tallahassee, Florida, I took the 270 degree exit ramp for Highway 90 going towards town. I was half way through the turn, going about 45 MPH, when I saw one of those painted arrows coming up. So, rather than take the chance of slipping on the arrow, I decided to pass it on the left side (outside of the turn). Everything was fine until my wheels began to slide on some loose sand near the edge of the road.Rather than attempt to lean the bike even further to bring it back onto the road, assuming that I might fall on the pavement, knowing that I only had jeans and a short sleeve shirt on, I make a quick decision to straighten the bike up and ride down the grassy embankment on the outside of the turn.
Now, along this exit ramp were metal reflector poles every few feet. The angle in which I went off the road made it difficult to thread between two of those poles at 45 MPH, but I made it through. At that moment, the ride became very bumpy, and I could see that at the bottom of the grassy knoll was HWY 90 and it was coming up fast. I applied the rear brake slightly and the bike began to fish tail on the wet grass, and I wasn’t slowing down much. I then instinctively applied the front brake and as you can imagine, in the next instant I found myself sliding down the grassy knoll face down and head first at about 40 MPH, the bike sliding ahead of me and slightly to my left.
I remember lifting my chin and looking out my helmet. The grass was whizzing by my face. Then I saw it…a big yellow merge sign rapidly approaching to my right. By this time, my body had shifted from head first to sliding with my left side first and I slammed into that merge sign just between my left pelvis and lower ribs. Fortunately, the pole that the sign was attached to was about a 2.5” round pipe.
I couldn’t breath. I rolled over and saw my bike lying there a few feet from me. The engine was still running. I reach out and hit the red kill switch. Then, I rolled onto my back, lifted my knees and opened my face mask and just lay there trying to catch my breath, wondering how bad I was hurt.
I had not been laying there long when a “Good Samaritan” peered into my helmet, cell phone in his hand and said, “Dude, I saw the whole thing! Do you want me to call 9-1-1 or…” He looked around as if his next words were Top Secret, “…or do you want to keep this quiet?”
At that moment, I wasn’t quite sure what to do, so I told him that I just wanted to lay there for a few minutes. Another “Good Samaritan” showed up about that time. After a couple of minutes, I asked if they could help me stand up. Each of them grabbed one of my hands and slowly helped me to my feet. Then, they picked up my KTM 625 SMC. There was grass all down one side and the right rear view mirror was cracked, but that was all the damage that I could see.
I got back on the bike, it started just fine. I thanked the guys for their timely assistance and for taking the time to stop and help me. I then got back on the interstate, rode home, and got in the tub to soak.
The extent of my injuries were two broken ribs on the lower left hand side, and one broken rib in the back near where it attaches to the spine. I also had a big bruise where I had impacted the merge sign pole.
Looking back, had I gotten a leg caught on one of the reflector poles, or slid out into the road on HWY 90, it could have been a lot worse. All things considered, the accident happened with the best possible outcome. The LORD and his angels were definitely looking out for me that day!
