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April 15, 2005 > News > Number of Beer-Bike EMS calls similar to previous years

Number of Beer-Bike EMS calls similar to previous years

By Risa Gordon | Thresher Editorial Staff

Except for last-minute cancellations of several colleges’ parade trucks and a crash during the alumni race that caused the race to end early without a winner, Beer-Bike proceeded routinely this year.

Beer-Bike injuries were similar to those of the past two years in severity and number, and parade fines decreased for the second consecutive year.

Most of the calls to Rice Emergency Medical Services April 2 were for minor injuries, although four people required transportation to the hospital, REMS Captain Nate Deal said. REMS responded to 25 calls related to Beer-Bike, 15 of which were associated with the parade and 10 of which were associated with the race. Last year, REMS responded to 24 calls, with four people requiring hospitalization.

Of the 15 calls associated with the parade, 11 were calls for people injured by water balloons, Deal, a Jones College senior, said. Other injuries during the parade included minor scrapes and abrasions. None of the calls made during Beer-Bike was alcohol-related.

“Twenty-five calls does seem like a lot … but a lot of people would come up to us for very minor injuries and ask for our opinion about whether or not they needed to go to the hospital,” Deal said. “And looking at the numbers, most people didn’t [need to go to the hospital]. It was [usually] just a very minor thing that we could treat there and send them back … to continue doing what they were doing.”

Deal said in previous years, REMS had trouble treating a large volume of injuries in a short period of time during Beer-Bike. This year, 17 emergency medical technicians were divided into four teams that were spaced throughout the parade and in the race area.

Race

The most severe Beer-Bike injury occurred during the alumni race. Will Rice College biker Larry Fossi (Will Rice ‘79) collided with Kerry Loughran (Martel ‘04), who was running as part of Martel College’s alumni team. The Martel team ran the race rather than biking it in tribute to Martel’s 2002 victory in Beer-Run, which replaced that year’s Beer-Bike because of rain. Fossi and Loughran collided as Fossi rounded the curve leading to the pit. Fossi, who was transported to hospital by ambulance, was discharged later in the day. Loughran was not seriously injured.

After Fossi’s accident, the remainder of the alumni race was cancelled. The decision to call the race was made jointly by Director of Student Activities Heather Masden, Rice University Police Chief Bill Taylor and REMS workers, Masden said.

“The injured alum needed to be taken care of immediately and not moved,” Masden said. “It would have been incredibly dangerous for this individual and for the EMS members handling the accident had the race continued.”

No official winner was declared in the alumni race because of uncertainty about whether times kept by judges after the accident accurately reflected the race, Campus-Wide Beer-Bike co-Coordinator Naaz Khumawala, a Wiess College junior, said.

The collision may prompt future rule changes to improve race safety, including a prohibition against running in the race, Campus-Wide Beer-Bike co-Coordinator Caitlin Weidig said.

“Whenever you have bikers going so fast, you just need to make sure that everyone takes it seriously, so that there’s no added danger that maybe was added this year,” Weidig, a Will Rice junior, said.

Parade

The parade ran smoothly but required last-minute cooperation between colleges so all colleges could participate. PV Rentals, a truck rental company used by several colleges, called some of the colleges Friday morning to cancel the reservations. PV cancelled Wiess’ reservation even though the college had reserved its truck online and called to confirm it, Wiess Beer-Bike Coordinator Jack Hardcastle said. Hardcastle, a junior, said PV told him it had corporate clients that had not returned the trucks, so it would be unable to fulfill all the truck requests for Saturday.

The college Beer-Bike coordinators had an emergency meeting Friday and decided to redistribute their trucks since some colleges had two trucks and others had none.

Security

About 100 people volunteered to work security during the race, Security Coordinator Christina Dicus said.

Joe Alberts, a Hanszen College junior, said his first Beer-Bike was a positive experience.

“It was a blast, and it’s really a testament to Rice — I’m a transfer — that that kind of behavior can go on and people will behave completely responsibly,” Alberts said. “At any other grouping of that large number of people, there would have been unpleasantness at that level of drunkenness.”

Fines

The fines paid by the colleges for rule violations in the parades decreased for the second consecutive year. This year, the colleges paid $1,720 in fines, compared to $3,100 in 2004 and $37,000 in 2003. As usual, each college received a 50-percent reduction in its fines for participating in the parade route cleanup. An additional 20-percent discount was taken off the fines with the expectation that the fines would be paid by April 22.

“The fines didn’t really seem to be that bad this year,” Weidig said. “I think that people on the whole were more aware of what the fines were, and security didn’t just give a bunch of fines.”

End of article

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