Two fatal accidents of a similar nature on one day in the French Quarter area is obviously a rare and tragic occurrence, especially for the victims’ families, relatives and friends. Two lives have been lost prematurely.
The reality is that riding a scooter offers little protection during collisions. There were three deadly crashes with such vehicles on the French side and at least one on the Dutch side in 2018, but also several years before.
That may still not seem like a lot until one considers the limited amount of motorcycles compared to cars. Judging by the 2019 licence plates ordered, these number respectively 1,000 and 33,278 registered in St. Maarten.
There have been many complaints in the recent past about the way some – not all – bikers act, swerving in and out of traffic in a highly irresponsible manner. Law enforcement authorities on either side of the open border at times conduct controls targeting this group, but that doesn’t seem to stop the often-young persons concerned from continuing their antisocial behaviour.
Both cases apparently involved speeding and overtaking, which is always risky on the island’s relatively narrow streets with many turns and sideroads. In the first one there was reportedly no evidence of wearing a safety helmet.
What makes this whole thing even harder to swallow is that local efforts were made to educate scooter riders and the Gendarmes offered a special 50cc engine training session at Galisbay. Not only that, but no fewer than five safety helmet awareness sessions where free helmets were given out took place in St. Martin last year.
No matter how sad, let these tragic deaths serve as a wakeup call for all motorists to drive with great care and take every possible precaution, to prevent a repeat in the future.
