Safe vehicles, safe riders

A cyclist was killed on Exchange Street, Aylesbury this morning. They say a lorry driver has been arrested and charged with dangerous driving. People tell me bikes are dangerous, but I reckon it's more the bigger faster vehicles that are dangerous.

But I have two men in my life who insist / insisted that they are /were safe and know /knew what they were doing. One is still alive and confident in his ability to control his vehicle, but like the other man, doesn't realise what prats other people can be, doesn't realise that someone else can make mistakes. People

• load their van with a loose ladder that will fall off in the street (as I witnessed this week),
• not tighten their car wheel nuts, so it could roll along the road and into your car,
• overload their glider, so spin onto you
• get distracted by barking dogs, so drive into you (as happened to this family in 2005)
  

You need three mistakes to have an accident. That was Ann Welch's assessment in her book, 'Accidents happen'. She's right.