back to article Thieves swipe biker's prosthetic hand

A disabled biker who left his prosthetic hand gripped to the handlebars of his Suzuki faces a bill for £450 for a new mitt after thieves made off with the original, the Sun reports. Jack Baker, 19, lost an arm back in May after a head-on collision with a bus in Bristol. He got an artificial hand to allow him to carry on riding …

COMMENTS

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  1. Chad H.

    come on

    its a bit of armless fun

    (I know, I'm terrible!)

  2. Owen Sweeney

    Ahem...

    I'm going out on a limb here, but I think the bandit who did the dastardly deed should face the chop.

    /gets coat.

  3. Simon

    Give up biking NOW!

    Just reading through this article is worrying.

    The guy has a head on collision with a bus, doesnt pack in biking and then mentions he goes racing. Someone who cant miss a bus shouldnt be on a ractrack.

    Then being daft enough to leave his artificial arm on his bike for two hours.

    Maybe God stole his arm and is trying to TELL HIM SOMETHING about giving up biking.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Plea

    Can't someone give this poor man a hand? Or perhaps a leg up?

    Don't worry, I'm leaving...

  5. Ru

    Give up?

    "The guy has a head on collision with a bus, doesnt pack in biking and then mentions he goes racing. Someone who cant miss a bus shouldnt be on a ractrack."

    Because I'm sure he just drove blindly in to it. Consider the possibility that motorcyclists can be involve in accidents which are not necessarily their fault.

  6. Duncan Hothersall

    The lesson here is

    that you should never leave your limbs unattended. Has he never seen those police stickers?

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Thieves swipe biker's prosthetic hand

    I would have thought your hacks could have come up with a better headline than that :)

    How about "HAND THEFT from AUTO"

  8. Ian Ferguson

    Re: Give up biking NOW!

    Simon: Maybe he's an adult and can make his own life decisions.

  9. Torcuill Torrance

    The pain, the screaming... it never ends...

    And Area Police later reported to have fingered the crim.

  10. Tim Williams

    Not always the bikers fault.

    In response to Simon's comment, "Give up biking NOW!".

    Some bikers are ticking time bombs of self destruction and as long as they are still alive they will take more and more risks until they get it completely wrong and do Darwin a favor and remove themselves from the gene pool. That's only a minority of bikers though and I think it's unfair to assume that a head on collision was his fault. Most bikers are capable of spotting things like buses and the odd car driver with the classic excuse; "sorry mate, I didn't see you". Statistically, odds are it was the bus that didn't see him...

  11. Liam Johnson

    Dear Dear

    He’d probably forget his head if it wasn’t screwed on!

  12. Paul C. Hartley

    Maybe...

    It was stolen by a one armed bandit

    I'll get my coat

  13. Simon

    Re: Give up biking NOW!

    OK, so some people disagreed with my comment.

    Im a biker myself, i ride to work everday (60 mile trip) all year round. My helmet is right next to me on my desk. I also did 8 years as a racetrack marshal and have scooped many a hot headed teen off the track because he would rather get knocked off than calm down for a second at a bad overtaking situation.

    It doesnt matter who saw who last, but on a bike you need to learn to survive, you look out for trouble, learn from your mistakes. No point saying its the other guys fault because a bike will always come off worse, so you need to ride in a defensive manner (Look it up on the web, defensive riding).

    There are two kinds of bikers, those who learn to anticipate dangerous situations before they occur. And those who shouldnt be on a bike.

    So once again, someone who hits an object like a bus shouldnt be on a motorbike.

  14. Joel Osborn

    He won't get away.

    He can't outrun the long arm of the law.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I was expecting to see loads of puns

    glad to see El Reg readers have a HANDle on things

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Two weeks ago we had

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/08/14/biker_mislays_leg/

    How long before we get a headless biker story?

  17. Burrelly

    FAO Simon

    You say you are a biker but seem to have no idea what actually happens on the roads. It is called an accident for a reason.

    You can ride as defensively as you like but you are not going to be able to avoid every danger all of the time. Every biker I have ever known has been involved in some kind of accident be it there fault or not. Should they all stop riding? You do not have any grasp of reality and I honestly do not believe if you have been riding that long you have not had an “off”

    There are aspects of the accident we do not know about. It may have been the bikers fault but if you are a biker you should know that 90% of the time it is the other road users fault.

    Please think before you post in future life as riding is not black and white.

  18. A. Merkin

    'Dis dis-arming is alarming

    Got to hand it to the "one arm" bandit who palmed the prosthetic; 'pinching' someone's arm without them knowing is pretty impressive.

    Hopefully a witness was near to hand, and can finger the perp for a BUSt. (Assuming the plods don't have their hands too full to nail this light-fingered knucklehead).

    Imagine the scene when the bobbies find the hand in the knicker's possession!

    But how did that 10 minutes turn into 2-hours? (You'd think he'd need both hands for that kind of delay with the GF). Maybe he lost his watch's hour hand in the accident too.

    So who's going to stump up the money for a replacement? The biker's bound to come up short; we should probably lend him a hand.

    The hand holding robber should be considered armed. On the other hand, the victim is dis-armed but very dangerous (on his wobbly bike).

    [The sound of one hand clapping for this utterly crap comment.]

    </tasteless>

  19. Craig McCormick

    Where's his sense?

    Knowle of all places?

    I'm astounded that the bike was still there. It's gert like proper rough in Knowle, innit?

  20. Some Guy

    Clutch?

    Anyone else curious how the bike was configured not to use the normal clutch?

  21. Jeremy

    Donations

    Some bikers in the U.S. would like to offer some donations to help the guy get a new hand. Anyone know how to go about doing that?

  22. b166er

    Hand-outs

    Well said Jeremy, we should all put our hands in our pockets

  23. Rick Brasche

    give up riding?

    I've been commuting daily for two years now-year round (the only good thing about California, the weather) and regularly rack up long solo or group rides (just put in a "quick" 100 mile loop last weekend).

    My helmet's not here at my desk but in my bike's trunk. So maybe I'm not as hardcore as "Simon", my JR mesh jacket and reinforced boots are right here. And I've never been to a track day, since this is my daily commuter I have no desire to risk damaging it pushing limits.

    I regularly avoid morons who never use turn signals, cell phone users, idiots actually TXTing while driving (WTF?!) and plenty of people who don't have a license or understand the English street signs. I'm paranoid, but I am not so arrogant to believe my continued survival is due solely to my skills.

    My riding mentor, who's been on two wheels for longer than I've been walking, has been knocked down as recently as last year. Damage to the bike, to his gear (AGATT) and stuff that healed (the older you get, the less you bounce, apparently). He's a lot better rider than most, but to follow the sage advice to "give it up!" after each accident would have him missing out on a lot of fun and savings in fuel usage.

    There are three types of riders: those who have gone down, and those who haven't. Of those who have fallen/been knocked down, there are those who got back on and those who stayed off. It's really only the second part where you have a choice-the first part, you can minimize risk only to a point. Life is dangerous, especially out of the cage, but Bad Luck can find you no matter where you hide.

  24. Daniel Ballado-Torres

    Arm Robbers

    Are these thieves the same ones from Nigeria? You know, those "Arm Robbers" that left my friend without money and with diminished English skills in Lagos?

  25. Daniel Winstone

    Title

    As an inhabitant of Bristol I'd like to say I find the "HAND THEFT from AUTO" comment hill....very funny indeed.

    That said though, does people need a constant reminder that they COULD be VICTIMS of crime despite the fact they haven't suffered from it personally for years or ever even?

    Stupidity dictates that the guy left something removable on a BIKE!!!! of all things. I read this story in the local paper and I'm sure in todays paper (28th August 2007) that someone left their bikes in "plain view" while on the bath to bristol cycle track for no more than 20 minutes and never more than 20-30 feet away and returned to find one bike gone. Vanished. Probably global warming. Or aliens.

    In the same paper it was reported on the front page that a guy had ten+ credit cards and bought pubs, lost money (cus he must be a crap manager/owner) and developed a drinking habit but doesn't really blame himself but the credit card companies, but acknowledges the fact that the debts are his responsibility but feels they shouldn't have allowed him so many cards with such high a limit. Duh! You're responsible for living within your means and yes taking a risk is valiant and hero like but only when it pays off. If one company goes under, maybe you might have better luck with the second, or even the third but after that you should accept the fact you don't know what a spreadsheet looks like or how to control your expenses and admit to yourself you like wearing nice clothes smoking cigars cus you own so much property you owe more than your minimum wage employees.

    Please give me a break (or 100K pounds to see how I'd cope with being an owner/manager)

  26. Aubry Thonon

    Can anybody ask him...

    .. to settle the old question of "one hand clapping"?

  27. Andy Worth

    Regardless.......

    ....of anything else, no-one can assume whether he was in the right or wrong with the bus accident. What I will say (despite the defensive comments from bikers) is that I've seen just as many accidents involving bikers which were their own fault as ones that weren't. You can regularly see bikers overtaking dangerously, and anyone who denies this is blind to the truth.

    Yes it MAY be a minority of bikers who do this, just like it is the minority of car drivers who daydream and use phones while driving etc.....The fact is that it only takes one of either kind to cause an accident. Believe me I'm not defending car drivers (I swear at bad drivers all the time) or attacking bikers, merely attacking the people who blindly defend their own "group" against evidence to the contrary.

    As for this bloke, at least he left his artificial hand attached and not the other one....

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re: Clutch

    Like this?

    http://www.nabd.org.uk/adaptions/adaptionkits.htm

  29. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re: Clutch

    It was his RIGHT arm he lost and his prosthetic RIGHT hand. If his arm was amputated in May it seems remarkably fast to be back on the road. I wonder whether he's actually passed his test in the intervening period?

  30. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    let yer fingers do the talking

    no wonder yer bikes got a big smile on her face, and walking funny.......bet Iknow where yer hand is.

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