Minutes of a Motorcycle Addict

Poor road maintenance led to the death of a motorcyclist in Norway in the summer of 2008. Now his family in what has been dubbed The Gjerdrum Case has taken the road owner Akershus county and its subcontractor to court.

Facsimile: MC-Bladet / MC24.no

At 14 May in 2008, warnings started to pour in to the NPRA regarding a potential dangerous out-washing and deterioration of aspahlt at a certain point on a road just outside Oslo. The warnings said that the damage on the road might lead to accidents. NPRA assigned its contractor Mesta to fix the road, but even after several days and several calls from the NPRA to Mesta, the road was still not fixed on the afternoon of 4 June. The last warning call was recorded at 1200 hrs on this day. Just before 1600 hrs, the rider Cato Paulsen runs his bike into the hole and the gravel around it, causing him to lose control of his bike, tipping over and skidding into an oncoming truck. The crash kills Paulsen.

The NPRA investigation group concluded that Paulsen apparently had been riding too fast, but independent research organisations backed by the Norwegian Motorcyclists' Union (NMCU) have provided data which more than indicates that the speed was low but the hole and gravel in the road was outright dangerous, and that this caused the fatal accident.

The family of Cato Paulsen has now sued the road owner Akershus county and its subcontractor Mesta for causing his death due to negligence of road maintenance even after receiving several warnings. This comes only a day after the Swedish Riders' Rights organisation SMC decided to pull its Road Authoritites and its subcontractor to court after a strech of particularly slippery asphalt caused a rider to skid and crash, losing his life in the accident.

Both these cases will hopefully demonstrate by court decisions that those responsible for road construction and maintenance have an objective responsibility towards its users - and then ALL road users, including motorcyclists. It has been too easy to blame the rider either for speeding or poor handling of the bike. Now enough is enough.

In both cases, there has been major media coverage (google translated). It is to hope that justice will be done for these two of our riding friends and their families.