Check Your Six

Updated: Friday, February 10, 2006, 10 AM

Check Your Six!

Hi! For those of you that don't already know me, my name is Anthony 'Tony'
Jaime and I am your new 2006 RAG HOG safety officer. Many of my long time
friends know me by my nickname, Tone-Dog. I have been riding motorcycles
since I was a kid here in Ridgecrest, where I have lived for the most part
since 1963. I started off riding dirt bikes on a Hodaka 90 and my first
street bike was a Honda CB 350. I bought my first Harley, a 1974 XLCH 1000
Sportster, right after my separation from the Marine Corps. I was just 21
years old and have been hooked ever since. With the purchase of a brand new
1200 Custom Sportster in 2001, I received my first year HOG membership and
joined our local group and this will be my fifth year as a HOG member.
Motorcycling has always played a major role in my life and as a result I
have also become involved in motorcyclist's rights organizations and I
belong to the Motorcycle Rights Foundation, a national MRO, as well as being
a member of ABATE of California, a state MRO where I hold a seat on the
Board of Directors. All of three of these organizations have helped me to
realize the importance of rider training and motorcycle awareness programs.
In addition, I am a 29-year member of the International Brotherhood of
Electrical Workers, Local 428 in Bakersfield, Ca. and as an electrical
construction worker that has worked on many large industrial construction
projects, I can state with certainty that safety has played a major role in
my life. Over the course of my life, I have seen many accidents occur, both
on the job and on the street. The primary message that I stress is that
almost all accidents that occur were preventable and should not have
happened. In essence, the best safety policy is based in accident avoidance
and prevention. As a motorcycle rider, don't place yourself in a position
where you can increase your chances of being involved in an accident. Over
the course of the year, we will be examining that philosophy several times.

So, let's move on with this month's safety message. Currently, it looks
like the weather is offering us better opportunities to ride and I see many
motorcycles out on the road taking advantage of that marvelous Southern
California climate. As we begin to move into the riding season in full
force, we should all take the time to review a few aspects of riding. While
many of us often ride solo, there are also a lot of folks that enjoy the
group rides and I'd like to review a few important guidelines that help
everyone to enjoy a good, safe group ride, and for me any ride that ends
with everyone returning home safely is a good ride. The following list is
from the Motorcycle Rider's Foundation and it offers some good common sense
advice for group rides, and I have inserted a few of my own comments to
augment their advice.

Arrive prepared. Arrive on time with a full gas tank.

Hold a riders' meeting. Discuss things like the route, rest and fuel stops,
and hand signals. Assign a lead and sweep (tail) rider. Both should be
experienced riders who are well-versed in group riding procedures. The
leader should assess everyone's riding skills and the group's riding style.

Keep the group to a manageable size, ideally five to seven riders. (This is
the MRF recommendation but we often ride in larger groups and I have gone on
rides with the main AV Chapter where we had to have more than one flight in
order to manage the groups.) If necessary, break the group into smaller
sub-groups, each with a lead and sweep rider. (For our local area and
highways, larger groups are not too problematic but in more heavily traffic
congested areas, it is often hard to maintain a large group of riders in
formation because of other traffic. This is especially true in major
metropolitan areas where other vehicles often dart in and out of traffic
lanes. This can present major problems for a large group trying to maintain
formation and riders should be prepared to adapt to changing traffic
conditions as warranted.)

Ride prepared. At least one rider in each group should pack a cell phone,
first-aid kit, and full tool kit, so the group is prepared for any problem
that they might encounter. (Additionally, as a rider, it is your individual
responsibility to make sure that you are properly clothed for the weather
and conditions you will be riding in. Properly fitting eye protection, a
properly sized helmet, along with good gloves, sturdy shoes or boots, face
wraps, chaps, and a leather motorcycle jacket are a minimum of protective
gear that a rider should normally have on hand to face conditions that can
change rapidly.)

Ride in formation. The staggered riding formation allows a proper space
cushion between motorcycles so that each rider has enough time and space to
maneuver and to react to hazards. The leader rides in the left third of the
lane, while the next rider stays at least one second behind in the right
third of the lane; the rest of the group follows the same pattern. A
single-file formation is preferred on a curvy road, under conditions of poor
visibility or poor road surfaces, entering/leaving highways, or other
situations where an increased space cushion or maneuvering room is needed.

Avoid side-by-side formations, as they reduce the space cushion. If you
suddenly needed to swerve to avoid a hazard, you would not have room to do
so. You don't want handlebars to get entangled.

If you're separated from the group, don't panic. Your group should have a
pre-planned procedure in place to regroup. Don't break the law or ride
beyond your skills to catch up.

For mechanical or medical problems, use a cell phone to call for assistance
as the situation warrants.

Periodically check the riders following in your rear view mirror. If you
see a rider falling behind, slow down so they may catch up. If all the
riders in the group use this technique, the group should be able to maintain
a fairly steady speed without pressure to ride too fast to catch up.

This last tidbit of advice forms the basis for one of my pet peeves. Too
many times I have known of riders that fell behind and then got into trouble
with no one around to assist them and no one even aware of their
difficulties. Last year, I was following a group of riders back from a food
basket delivery in Trona in my Jeep when I saw a large cloud of dust ahead
and cars pulling over. When I got to the scene, I could see that a rider
had gone down but none of the other riders in the group was even aware that
he had gone down. Fortunately, I was behind in the Jeep and even more
fortunately; he didn't sustain any major life-threatening injuries. I drove
him to the hospital and none of the others even knew he had crashed until
after they were back in town. In this instance, everything turned okay but
the outcome could have been much worse, especially if there hadn't been
someone to render assistance in close proximity. When we ride in a group,
we need to be aware of everyone in the group, including those behind us, and
not ride on with our eyes focused in front, blissfully unaware that a member
of the group is in trouble.

Moreover, many of the hazards we face on the road often come from other
vehicles coming up behind us very fast and taking a rider by surprise,
especially when it involves one of those jack rabbit lane changers in a
cage. I know that motorcycle mirrors often vibrate at higher speeds and it
makes it hard to see traffic in them, but nevertheless it is important to
maintain eye contact with the traffic conditions through our rearview
mirrors. One technique I have developed is to find the sweet spots on my
speedometer where the mirror doesn't vibrate at highway speeds and I can see
clearly, and periodically adjust my throttle to take advantage of that fact
to check behind me. Another technique is to just steady the left-hand
mirror with my left hand long enough to make a quick check, as long as it's
safe to do so.

In the world of the fighter pilot, there is a term for watching the area to
your rear. It is called checking your six, or a more appropriate term is
situational awareness. With that thought in mind, I asked my good friend
Tom Pearl, a former A-6 pilot, a long time motorcycle enthusiast and one
fine moto-cross racer to share with us a few words about situational
awareness and checking your six and this is what he gave me.

When going in harm's way, the Viet Nam era Navy fighter pilot relied on his
wingman (whom he never flew without) and a scan pattern of the area ahead,
to the sides, and behind his aircraft to develop a keen awareness of the
three-dimensional world they flew in. They called it Situational Awareness,
or more simply, SA. The combat pilots of today still rely on their SA to
get them to the target and back home safely. Modern fighter pilots have
satellite imagery, on-board sensors, and help from high-flying AWACS
aircraft that can guide them and give them crucial information as to who and
what is around them so they can react in time to save their life. Riding
the highways and freeways of today, HOG members are more like the Viet Nam
pilot than the fearless Hornet or Harrier pilot in Afghanistan or Iraq. We
don't have the luxury of an automatic 360-degree picture of our small
universe as we roll down the two-dimensional roads of America. We need to
be thinking like the Viet Nam fighter pilot. The most dangerous things to
us are those things we cannot see. And we will never see them if we don't
keep our head "on a swivel", as pilots from the old days will tell you.
This includes developing a scan pattern while you are riding that includes
your rear-view mirrors, which you have already accurately adjusted to show
you what is happening behind you. That area has always been called "six o'clock"
by fighter pilots the world over. It is a term of relative position as if a
clock face was superimposed vertically over an aircraft. Directly in front
of the aircraft (or motorcycle) is "12 o'clock". Directly behind is "6 o'clock",
and left and right are "9 o'clock" and "3 o'clock" respectively. A keen,
safe SA can only be accomplished by "checking your six" often in your normal
riding routine. It could save your buddy (or your wife or girlfriend ) the
embarrassment of being left behind as you blissfully motor away without a
clue that they have stalled, made a wrong turn, or been involved in a
mishap. It can also save you from a rear-ender or prepare you for a
high-speed pass by a young ignorant doing a wheelie on a crotch-rocket. As
the fighter pilots keep telling themselves, Check Six!

As Tom explains so clearly, "the most dangerous things to us are those
things we cannot see" which is why it is so important to us as motorcycle
riders to develop a habit of maintaining our situational awareness, and
especially to develop a scan pattern as part of our daily riding habits that
includes checking our six. Being aware of the position of other vehicles
around us, particularly those behind us can be crucial, especially if there
is a need to make an evasive maneuver to avoid a hazard that crops up
unexpectedly in front of us. It can also save us from being rear-ended or
side-swiped and severely injured or even killed by an inattentive driver
going too fast.

Well folks, that's about it for this issue. I hope I have offered you some
valuable information and advice for your riding safety and look forward to
bringing you more of the same next issue. Until then, ride safe, ride free,
and ride often.

~tony~