Two cyclists, aged 91 and 56, died within a day of each other this week on Brooklyn (NYC) streets: one fell, and a hit-and-run truck driver hit the other.
As of Thursday, seven cyclists have died in the city so far this year, five more than this time last year, according to NYPD statistics.
The first fatal accident this week happened about 6:55 p.m. Tuesday in Sheepshead Bay, police said yesterday. George Attias was riding his electric bicycle eastbound on Belt Parkway, and was about to exit at the Plumb Beach rest stop when he struck the curb.
The nonagenarian was thrown from his bike and hit his head as he fell into the right lane. Paramedics rushed him to NYU Langone Hospital-Brooklyn, where he died Wednesday. Attias lived in Brighton Beach, about two and a half miles from where he crashed, the Daily News detailed.
The next day, Thursday night, Eugene Schroeder (56) became the second cyclist killed this week when he was struck by a truck in Brooklyn.
Schroeder was pedaling in the bike lane around 11:30 p.m. Thursday when he was hit by a turning truck at the corner of Morgan and Johnson Aves. in East Williamsburg, police said.
The man bolted from his bicycle and was found lying on the asphalt with a massive head injury. He was transported to Elmhurst Hospital, where he died. The driver did not stop, and police were searching for him.
The startling increase in bicycle fatalities in 2023 comes as police had celebrated a steady drop in such fatalities since 2019 when they totaled 28 people, a 20-year high. In 2021 there were 19 pedal cyclist deaths, and 17 in 2022, NYPD counted.
One of this year’s victims was Hispanic Jacobo Villano Pardo, who tragically died in February at 32 when his electric bicycle crashed into a sidewalk in Riverside Park on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. On impact, she fell off her bike and landed on the asphalt, hitting her head like Attias’ accident this week.
Also in February, a 53-year-old bicyclist was fatally struck in a collision between an NYPD patrol van and a black Honda sedan in the parking lot of the Beach Channel Mall in Queens.
Days earlier, a 44-year-old pedal-cyclist died hours after being struck by the driver of a U-Haul van that left several injured as it mounted sidewalks in Brooklyn, an incident described as “horrible and despicable” by Mayor Eric Adams.
No arrests have been made or suspects identified in Thursday’s case. Anyone with information should call 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) and in Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782), also via crimestoppers.nypdonline.org or by text message to 274637 (CRIMES), followed by TIP577. All communications are strictly confidential.