‘Put on the damn helmet’: Vancouver comedian urges safety following e-scooter collision

A Vancouver comedian is urging e-scooter riders to take simple safety measures, after she says a helmet saved her from serious injuries during a collision last month.

Jessica Pigeau was riding north on Alder Street between West 11th and West 12th Avenues on July 19, when she said the driver of a southbound SUV suddenly turned left in front of her, and there was no time to stop.

“I just slammed my head right into the hood and I’m very lucky I was wearing a helmet,” Pigeau recalled Friday.

Pigeau said she was travelling at around 15-20 kilometres an hour before she hit the passenger side of the vehicle, and her head bounced off the hood.

While her e-scooter was significantly damaged and is now unrideable, Pigeau said she walked away with only light bruising.

“I have no doubt that if I had not been wearing a helmet, I would have gone to the hospital,” Pigeau told Global News. “At minimum, I would have been a concussion, probably a broken nose.”

Vancouver police are boosting their education campaign on social media, following the death of a woman last month.

Shyan Lolly, 30, was riding a scooter on July 3 in the area of Venables Street and Commercial Drive at 10 a.m. when she collided with the side of a vehicle.

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Lolly, who was not wearing a helmet, hit her head on the ground and was conscious when she was transported to hospital, but died from her injuries on July 11.

Her family has since issued a plea for riders to wear helmets.

1:52 Burnaby RCMP steps up e-scooter enforcement

The Community Against Preventable Injuries said over the last couple of years B.C. has seen about 175 to 180 adult-related scooter injuries severe enough to require hospitalization.

Co-executive director Dr. Ian Pike said current e-scooter injury statistics are a big underestimation because the province’s data capture systems are always catching up to new trends in terms of recording injuries.

BC Children’s Hospital, which Pike said has a very comprehensive surveillance system within the emergency department, has seen injuries related to e-scooter falls or collisions double over the last two years, from about 37 to 80 cases.

Meantime, he said, trauma-related e-scooter injuries in children aged 10 to 14 have tripled in the same time period – from five to 15.

“Overall, the trends are all going in the wrong direction from our point of view in terms of those who do injury prevention,” Pike said in an interview Friday. “These are alarming, they’re increasing at a rate that we should not accept and we need to intervene.”

Pike is urging parents not to let their kids under 16 ride e-scooters illegally, and for riders to take all the safety precautions cyclists are required to.

“A helmet and other protective gear is essential,” Pike said, adding that other jurisdictions have made a learner’s driver’s licence a minimum requirement for operating e-scooters, which he believes makes sense.

Pigeau said she had not been habitually wearing her helmet and only put it on on the day of the crash because she had come across multiple news stories on injuries related to e-bikes and e-scooters.

“I just thought this is stupid, I have a helmet, I should be wearing the helmet and that morning was the morning I put on the damn helmet – and that was the morning I had the accident,” Pigeau said in an interview. “The helmet’s not going to do anything but muss up your hair but on the day that it matters, either it means that you’re not going to the hospital – or it means you get to see your family again.”