Weekend Awesome - Loose License Plate Impales Motorcycle

Dennis Chung
by Dennis Chung

It’s always a bit disconcerting when you’re riding along and suddenly spy something flying directly towards you. Whether it’s a piece of litter, an insect, or perhaps a piece of gravel falling off a dump truck, the first instinct is to try to dodge, but if you’re moving too fast, you can only hope it’ll leave nothing but a small smear without scratching the paint.

But what if that piece of debris was a metal license plate coming loose from the motorcycle ahead and flying toward you like a government-certified ninja star? That’s what happened in this week’s video when a loose plate strikes and impales another rider’s Honda CBR954RR.

The Honda rider was lucky the plate hit his fairing and not him; armored or not, he could have been seriously injured in this freak accident. If that was me, the first thing I’d do after making sure I wasn’t hurt was check to see if I had soiled myself.

Dennis Chung
Dennis Chung

Dennis has been a part of the Motorcycle.com team since 2008, and through his tenure, has developed a firm grasp of industry trends, and a solid sense of what's to come. A bloodhound when it comes to tracking information on new motorcycles, if there's a new model on the horizon, you'll probably hear about it from him first.

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  • Guest Guest on Dec 02, 2014

    I was doing a woman friend a favor one afternoon. She had bought a HD Deluxe from a private owner on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. She needed a close reach seat installed so it would fit her short legs before riding the bike.
    . So, she called me up and ask if I could ride the bike to her place about 40 mile ride.
    We got the bike...cruised down the road a bit stopped for gas. Headed back down the road at about 60mph...I see this Turkey Buzzard in the middle of the road munching on some road kill. I'm coming up on it ..it's still not moving. I moved a bit to the right...just as I got up to it....it doesn't take off in the opposite direction,,,but my way. I just ducked enough. Gosh those Buzzards are huge when there right on top of you. My woman friend following me in her car said the wind span looked almost the size of her bike.
    So, need to really slow down.....buzzards want to make more road kill ...hungry bastard.

  • Rich Hoffmann Rich Hoffmann on Dec 02, 2014

    I was doing a woman friend a favor one afternoon. She had bought a HD
    Deluxe from a private owner on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. She needed
    a close reach seat installed so it would fit her short legs before
    riding the bike.
    . So, she called me up and ask if I could ride the bike to her place about 40 mile ride.
    We
    got the bike...cruised down the road a bit stopped for gas. Headed back
    down the road at about 60mph...I see this Turkey Buzzard in the middle
    of the road munching on some road kill. I'm coming up on it ..it's still
    not moving. I moved a bit to the right...just as I got up to it....it
    doesn't take off in the opposite direction,,,but my way. I just ducked
    enough. Gosh those Buzzards are huge when there right on top of you. My
    woman friend following me in her car said the wing span looked almost
    the size of her bike.
    So, need to really slow down.....buzzards want to make more road kill ...hungry bastard.

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