Crash characteristics of motorcyclists impacting road side barriers

Motorcyclist serious injuries and fatalities significantly contribute to road trauma in Australasia. The role of road side safety barriers in such trauma is an area of growing concern amongst motorcyclists, road authorities and road safety researchers and advocates. This paper is the second of a series of papers presenting results from a retrospective case study of motorcyclists that were fatally injured following a collision with a road side barrier during the period 2001 to 2006 in Australia and New Zealand. In this paper, characteristics of the crashes such as barrier and motorcycle types, crash modes, motorcyclist kinematics, pre-crash speeds and impact trajectory angles are documented.