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Two motorcyclists dead in O'Neill Tunnel crash
By adamg on Sat, 06/08/2019 - 9:42am
Backup in the tunnel after the crash. Photo by KMV.
UPDATE: State Police have identify the dead men as Jerry Alphones, 28, of Everett, on a 2006 Honda CBR600, and Aralt Cesaire, 26, of Medford on a 2004 Suzuki GSX-R600, add: "Speed is believed to have been a factor."
State Police report a ride by several motorcyclists through the O'Neill Tunnel northbound around 2 a.m. ended with two of them crashing and dying.
For reasons that are still under investigation, two of the operators lost control of their motorcycles in the tunnel at Exit 23 and crashed, each suffering fatal injuries. Both were determined to be deceased on scene.
At least two other motorcycle operators who were with the victims remained on scene.
State Police identified the victims only as "two young males," pending notification of next of kin.
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Comments
Very sad
Sadness for their families and communities.
Tragic.
Condolences to their families and friends.
It's early, I know, but lots of questions to be answered:
How large was this group of "several"?
Were the victims wearing helmets? Were they impaired?
Were the bikes street legal and registered?
I truly hope this wasn't one of the bike mobs, motorized and manual, that are becoming more frequent on the city streets.
"I truly hope"
Why would it matter if it was 1, 4, or 32 bikes?
The variables dont matter, people are dead.
The two dead are past caring.
The two dead are past caring.
The two who stopped are certainly traumatized.
If others were involved in the accident and left the scene - that's criminal.
But - why would it matter?
If it was a pack of wild, joy-riding, reckless drivers on bikes that might not be street or highway legal (such as there have been complaints about from city residents for years) where for lack of official will or applicable law not enough was done to shut them down - you might now see a change in will or law.
Relax
Just be quiet. It’s summertime and this is the norm for motorcyclists. You’re dissecting the situation and reading too much into it. It’s unfortunate that they passed away. Let the police investigate and don’t post comments speculating because I’m highly annoyed
We'll have the people over at
We'll have the people over at the old Hancock turn on the appropriate beacon colors so the populace know you're annoyed.
.
In the meantime, the rest of us will go about our business.
Dismemberment
There's video online of the aftermath where it's clear that one of the deceased riders was dismembered by the railing in the tunnel.
I hope the local news stations dig a bit and report on what was the outcome of the 2011 report from MassDOT that said they'd be replacing/removing the death rails from the tunnels. Did that work ever get done? Did they choose to leave some of them in place? Were these the replacement rails and they still harmed this guy?
Why assume the railing was
Why assume the railing was the cause?
It's not that the railings caused the crashes
But that they possibly contributed to what happened to at least one of the motorcyclists.
It's kind of the same theory as making car manufacturers install glass windshields that shatter into a billion little relatively harmless pieces in a crash rather than cracking into several large pieces that can fatally stab somebody in a crash, as used to happen.
I think someone took it (the
I think someone took it (the video) down.
There's assorted news videos - slow drive-by while state police do their investigation, the motorcycles lying in the left lane (presumably where they came to rest), bits & pieces of broken plastic, a helmet. Nothing in those little clips from which one could conclude "dismemberment" or "railings"
Probably just as well Twitter (I think) took it down
I did see the videos (there were two, by the same person) and while I do not know what role the railing did or did not play, they show that at least one of the riders never had a chance (I also learned a valuable lesson: Never retweet a video from your phone if you're not absolutely sure what you're looking at - at best, you should just make sure what you're looking at and then create a link to the video with a warning rather than retweeting what is basically an auto-playing video that is quite clear on any screen larger than a phone).
We saw different videos
When the torso and the legs are 30 feet apart, I conclude that one victim was in fact dismembered.
The complaints about the
The complaints about the railings said their design meant motorcyclists often died when hitting them at low speeds like 30 mph, which doesn't happen for other types of railings.
But in this case, the police said speed was a factor. So a different railing probably wouldn't have helped.
they removed most of the
they removed most of the railings after a similar accident (accidents?) but left the railings in front of all the access doors.....if the railing wasn't there it might have been a different outcome