The father of a New Brunswick man who was severely injured in a motorcycle accident is launching an organization to financially support injured bikers.
Mike and Kendra Burden were out for a ride on their motorcycle nearly a year ago when they were struck by an impaired driver in a Fredericton traffic circle. The Burdens both suffered severe life-changing injuries and spent weeks in the hospital.
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Michael Burden, who is the father of one of the victims, said the family faced financial hardship immediately following the accident.
That led him to organize a motorcycle show and fundraiser to help the family cope with the financial situation. From that, Michael Burden said he realized something needed to be done to help others who might face similar situations down the road.
“I promoted a motorcycle show to raise funds for them, and from that, I realized that there’s a lot of other motorcycle riders who get injured and maybe we could do more to help more of the riders.”
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The organization is called Bikers Down Support and is modelled after the Bikers Down Society that was created in Nova Scotia in 2008. Burden said the group was formed over the past couple weeks.
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“It’s given me a focus,” said Burden. “My family in particular, the victims, Mike and Kendra, are still facing difficult times, their children … they’re still adjusting, there’s still a lot of trauma and stuff that they’re recovering from and it’s given me a focus to put my thoughts into so I’m not just sitting around thinking about what kind of problems they’re having,” Burden said.
Bikers Down Support public relations liaison Melani Palmer, who is also the niece of Mike Burden, said she’s lost friends and family to impaired driving and wanted to offer her support.
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“It’s kind of from the heart. It means a lot and to be part of something where we’re going to be helping so many people and not just those that are injured, but their families because there’s so much that people don’t realize that actually happens that takes place behind the scene of that trauma,” Palmer said.
Bikers Down Support secretary Victoria Fleiger said the accident “hit close to home” and said she wanted to help out.
Marco LeBlanc joined the organization as the vice-president after years in the military working as a sergeant. He said he also went through a similiar experience with his own family in Quebec, after his father was severely injured in a snowmobile incident in 1997.
“We had to come back from that accident and deal with him being in a wheelchair for the final 18 years of his life,” LeBlanc said.
He said he knows all too well the financial situation some families face following a life-changing accident and said his community came together to help out.
He said he wants to be able to help other families have the same support that he and his family did.
Burden said there will be a formal application process and anyone found to have been driving while impaired or driving wrecklessly will be ineligible for financial support.
“We would like this to be eventually across Canada. Nova Scotia was the start, New Brunswick is the next, and hopefully we will see the rest of the provinces and even the northern territories join and all have a Bikers Down Society following our, their model,” Burden said.
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