“Looks like the cyclist deliberately made contact with the car”: Driver pulls across three lanes and hits cyclist – and motorists claim cyclist was at fault

A rush hour collision between a cyclist and a motorist, who pulled across three lanes before hitting the rider, has sparked a heated debate on social media, where motorists have claimed that the female cyclist was at fault for failing to avoid the collision – with some drivers even claiming that the rider deliberately steered into the vehicle.

The clip, which was captured by the dash cam of cyclist Gary’s Transit van, was posted on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter on Thursday night and has since been viewed over 170,000 times.

It shows a hi-vis-clad female cyclist riding in a bus lane East Bridge Street, just outside Lanyon Place railway station, in the direction of Belfast city centre at around 7.45am in the morning, when a motorist, travelling in the opposite direction, pulled across three lanes and hit the rider, who emerged relatively unscathed from the collision.

This morning heading into Belfast city centre. 🫣 @theJeremyVine @MikeyCycling @StormontCyclist @anneramsey740 @CyclingUK_NI @PassPixi pic.twitter.com/aKsUibpXT4

— Gazza (@garyarrell) January 25, 2024

Describing the collision, Gary said: “I did not let the car across, I was leaving the gap for the car on the left emerging. But the driver indicated and pulled across so quickly, assuming it was clear to go, he didn’t check.

“He didn’t see the cyclist because he plain didn’t look for it. His reactions were good when he did to be fair. He had stopped (just about) but the cyclist was on the brakes and slowing down.

He continued: “The cyclist could have anticipated a little better, but her head is clearly up and she is on the brakes. Can’t brake and swerve at the same time on two wheels or you’ll hit the deck.

“We all have a duty of care on the roads but no you can’t rely on anyone these days. Some take that duty of care more seriously than others.”

> Motorists blame crash victim Dan Walker for not riding on underpass cycle lane – described by locals as “filled with broken glass”

Despite Gary’s rather balanced appraisal of the collision, the clip – rather inevitably – led to a deluge of motorists claiming that the cyclist was solely at fault for the crash.

“If the cyclist was paying attention, he/she could have avoided that,” wrote Kesh. “Also, the car clearly hasn’t seen the cyclist coming due to visibility being blocked by cam car.”

“Car stopped the second it saw the cyclist, the vehicle recording blocked the view of the other driver seeing the cyclist, cyclist didn’t apply his brakes in time because he was travelling too fast at a busy junction,” added another user.

“Bike’s fault. I’m not even trying to cause an argument,” said Earl. “When filtering you have to take responsibility at junctions. The bike just went for it. Car has a right to turn and it would have been impossible to see the bike in them conditions.”

> “I love it when drivers harass me for breaking rules they made up in their head”: Motorist tells cyclist he’ll “get a ticket for being in the bus lane”… while driving an untaxed car

Some motorists, meanwhile, even attempted to claim that the cyclist had intentionally made contact with the motorist’s vehicle to cause the collision.

“It might just be the camera angle, but if you slow the video down just as the cyclist comes into frame, it looks like he changed angle to make sure he made contact with the car,” wrote Kevin. “Also he could have narrowly avoided the car by pulley slightly to the left.”

“He’s done the equivalent of sticking your leg out to make contact with the defender to win a penalty,” agreed LF. “Shocking dive, yellow card worthy.”

Car was in cyclists blind spot and wasn’t in hi-viz. cyclist didn’t stand a chance.

— FoobarSaunders (@FoobarSaunders) January 26, 2024

That particular argument was swiftly condemned by Gary and other Twitter-using cyclists.

“Didn’t change direction and she was attempting to brake in a straight line. If she had changed direction with the wet road on the brakes the most likely outcome was her falling off anyway. She did NOT intentionally hit the car,” said Gary.

“Another person who feels the need to bend over backwards to find a reason – ANY reason – why the car driver shouldn’t be blamed. Do you seriously think we cyclists deliberately try to get hit by cars? WHY???” asked Ymke.

Finally, Andreas summed the whole debate up: “I see the comments are mostly that the cyclist was at fault for (checks notes) cycling.”

.@PSNIBelfast driver of CMZ 3116 pulled diagonally into the bike box, getting unnecessarily close to both the cyclists and the white car, then decided to get out, nearly hitting the other car and scream at the cyclists for having the audacity to point out the bike box. pic.twitter.com/zWBX8K244f

— The Belfast Urbanist 🚋 (@BelfastUrbanist) January 12, 2024

Ironically, the hotly debated collision took place mere yards away from another incident that caused a mini-social media furore two weeks ago. That incident, which happened on the same road but in the opposite direction, saw a driver pull diagonally into a bike box, almost colliding with cyclists and an adjacent car.

After the cyclists had pointed out the motorist’s mistake, he then emerged from his vehicle to berate the riders, holding up traffic as the lights turned green.

> "You must stop driving and surrender your licence to the authorities": Jeremy Vine in disbelief at people blaming cyclist for shocking crash which saw driver jailed

And in December, footage released by West Midlands Police, showing the moment a 71-year-old cyclist was left with a bleed on the brain, a broken shoulder, and a broken ankle after a driver ignored give way markings and caused the collision, provoked a wave of social media users queuing up to defend the motorist’s driving.

Despite the motorist being jailed for 12 months after pleading guilty to causing serious injury by careless driving, some claimed that the cyclist was “irresponsible” and “shouldn’t have been going that fast”, and that they were “probably breaking the speed limit but clearly not proceeding towards a major crossing with caution”.

Responding to those questionable replies, BBC and Channel 5 presenter Jeremy Vine, who cycles around London and posts videos of his travels on social media, wrote: “Watch the red car. Watch the cyclist. Now ask yourself, ‘Was the woman on the bicycle to blame in any way for that collision? Should she have avoided it?’

“If your answer is any version of yes, YOU MUST stop driving and surrender your driving licence to the authorities.”