FJRiders.com

bill lumberg wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 7:21 pm I’m having difficulty extricating myself from work stuff. May be able to attend visitation Sunday (likely). I know several others are in flux trying to make an appearance. I’m interested in who might make a visit on what day, so I know who to look for.

Hppants wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 8:20 pm I'm coming to the visitation. I want to look that lady in the eye and tell her how sorry I am.

Let's meet on Sunday night and drink a toast to our friend.

Hppants wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 8:20 pm I'm coming to the visitation. I want to look that lady in the eye and tell her how sorry I am.

Let's meet on Sunday night and drink a toast to our friend.

Redfish wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 8:57 pm

Hppants wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 8:20 pm I'm coming to the visitation. I want to look that lady in the eye and tell her how sorry I am.

Let's meet on Sunday night and drink a toast to our friend.

I simply cannot get away this time. Please represent Pop and me.

Redfish wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 8:57 pm

Hppants wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 8:20 pm I'm coming to the visitation. I want to look that lady in the eye and tell her how sorry I am.

Let's meet on Sunday night and drink a toast to our friend.

I simply cannot get away this time. Please represent Pop and me.

1911 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 27, 2019 1:15 am

wheatonFJR wrote: ↑Tue Mar 26, 2019 8:18 am Sorry I messed up a perfect ride....

We rode good riding. Wheat put on a show. Then we went to dinner.
Riding, dinner and a show. What's to be sorry for?

1911 wrote: ↑Sun Mar 31, 2019 11:11 pm The Wheaton incident, viewed from the 6th hole.

Posting in part because there were some things very well done here and maybe some things that could have been done better.

The day couldn’t have started much better. Mark and I have posted up a lot of rides out of Greenville over the last few years. This one had one of the all time best turnouts. Last summer’s ride and cookout at Casa De Wheaton was the only other one with a turnout like last Sunday’s. 9 riders showed up for breakfast. Mark, Tommy, JWilly, Cav, Prestone, the Zooms Jim and Iris, and I showed up for breakfast and the ride. Griff showed up to eat with us before taking off to chase BMR bonii. The waitress put my breakfast on Prestone’s check. Like I said, good start.

An 8 rider group ride is on the edge of being manageable. Mark and I linked Senas during the pre-trip. We discussed breaking up into two groups and decided to leave options open until we see how things shook out. I moved to mid pack where I could keep connected to Mark and keep an eye on Tail end Charlie. The natural running order of things seemed to work itself out fairly quickly. Mark was leading, with Tommy, JWilly, Cav, Prestone, Me and the Zooms in tow. When we’d get to a known-good stretch of fun stuff of decent length Mark would send JWilly and Tommy on ahead and tell them where to wait up. This is SOOO much like a group of buddies running an off-road enduro event that it’s stunning!* The first five certainly weren’t holding me up and I didn’t SEEM to be holding up the Zooms. So we were sort of split into two groups by nature.

We left Stax and shuffled over to 178 (transfer section) where the known-good fun stuff started. The group chased Tommy and JWilly up 178 and 215 to Canton. Transfer section to 209. Then it was more known-good fun up NC209, NC208, NC212 and TN352 to Erwin, where I had to get gas (because I was riding the only, less fuel efficient, Black Cherry color, FJR in the group-not because riding like a squid burns more fuel).

From Erwin Mark was leading through another “transfer section”, US19W over to Bakersville, were the next section of fun stuff was to begin, the run up Roan Mountain.

The group was working around some four wheel traffic, but not in a terrible hurry. This was good road, but still just a “transfer section”. By the time The Zooms and I had cleared the four wheelers there was a little gap between us and the first half or so of the group.

I came around a corner and saw one of our riders standing on the side of the road waving down traffic. A few more yards, one of us, face down and motionless and a FJR scattered about. I didn’t know a stomach could knot up that fast.

I did a couple u-turns, parking my bike on the side of the road well within the line of sight of oncoming traffic and turned on the hazard lights. Turning on the hazard light switch did no good at all, once I removed the ignition key to open a saddlebag to get at my first aid kit. By the time I got back up to the scene Mark had been rolled onto his back, moved the minimal amount to ensure a clear airway-well done, seems to me. His helmet stayed on until first responders arrived. His eyes were open and he was starting to come around but Jim said it best: “the lights were on but nobody was home”.

If you came upon the scene and asked who was in charge, my opinion would be that JWilly was lead man, Cav a close #2.

We were 2 miles southeast of the TN state line on US19W. There was no cell signal. Passers-by were asked to phone for help. JWilly had fired of his Spot Tracker “Oh Sh*t!” function. Mark began to try to move around but was quickly told to knock it off. Mark could feel and move what we asked him to feel and move, although he didn’t respond with a slap to Cav’s face as he should have, when Cav copped a feel while claiming to be looking for Mark’s phone, or maybe Mark liked it?. There were some questions he couldn’t answer, though he knew the material. We answered his questions, no matter how many times he asked them. His bell had obviously been rung.

Cav, interrupting my useless milling about, voiced concern that as far as getting help, we were leaving Mark’s fate in the hands of strangers and their ability to describe our location. I reset a tripmeter as Prestone and I mounted up and took off in search of a cell signal. I shot up the driveway at the first house with a sign of life outside. No signal and the occupant said that he didn’t have a land line, but that the folks two places down on the left did. Man, houses are a long way between up here. We pulled into a drive a ways down on the left with a fellow outside. Yeah! Two bars. A call to 911 and a transfer from TN dispatch to NC dispatch (“You mean even though we are only TWO miles out of TN you can’t send somebody from Erwin?!?!?!”) confirmed that help was already on the way.

By the time Prestone and I got back to the group volunteer first responders were on scene. Mark’s main concern seemed to be shoulder pain. Relief! Then the ambulance arrived. Then the ambulance broke down. Then another ambulance arrived-eventually.

And eventually Mark had been hauled off. JWilly had taken off to let Mrs Wheaton know what was going on and to let his own family know to stop worrying about that little Spot Tracker Emergency thingy.

The rest of us waited around for the wrecker. Mark’s bike, though obviously totaled was loaded upright, and tied off front and rear WITH A CANYON DANCER-well done Decolas Towing.

Mark’s gear and stuff was split up among a few riders to be taken back to Travelers Rest. One of us, Cav?, had a Givi rack with no Givi, and that’s where Mark’s Givi rode the rest of the trip.

Once the wrecker and Mark’s stuff was loaded we all followed Cav to the ER where we met up with JWilly and Louanne. We got an update then got the heck out of there. Hospitals are creepy.

What could have been done better? Mark could have crashed AFTER lunch. By now breakfast was a distant memory and a hungry man is a dangerous man. We all went to get a pizza. Except JWilly. Something about a long ride home.

I will say this though. Mark, being the ever considerate host, did at one point while lying in the dirt on the side of a mountain, ask if we had been to lunch yet. I said no and asked him if he was hungry. He said no, proving that it was us he was thinking about.

What can be done for future improvement? JWilly can publish a “what to do in case of a dismount” checklist on a pocket card to be carried by all. Thinking straight may not come easy when it’s a friend in the ditch.

Get well soon Mark.


*edit, the enduro reference explained https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YUL ... =sharing