‘I should have been safe on a pavement’ – woman recalls horrific hire e-bike crash

Sandy Peters has no memory of the moment her life changed last October. She was walking on the pavement with her son near Grove Park in south London on his birthday when a speeding Forest dockless e-bike struck her. Her face collided with a brick wall, causing severe and complex injuries. Broken nose, cheekbones, and teeth left her in a state of shock, as she recalls the incident with difficulty.

“I have no recollection of the impact or what happened,” she tells BBC London. “The bike hit me on the right-hand side. It was so fast that I didn’t have time to react. My face smashed into the wall.”

A warning note accompanies the story: it includes images of facial injuries that might disturb readers. The trauma of the crash was immediate. Sandy describes lying on the ground, hearing an unusual sound from her mouth while blood poured from her nose and mouth. “I couldn’t breathe,” she says, adding that she felt “a heavy metal grate pressing down on my face” as she struggled to rise.

“Paramedics had to insert a tube down my throat three times to clear blood before I could be moved,” she explains. “I was taken to a local hospital for four hours, then transferred under emergency lights to another facility where I stayed for seven days.”

Though the physical injuries are still healing, the emotional toll remains. Sandy now suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and faces the cost of £10,000 to repair her damaged teeth. “I’m unsure how I’ll afford that,” she says. Her upper jaw is out of alignment with her lower jaw, and the dental work is a key concern.

Following the accident, Sandy was frustrated to discover Forest, the e-bike operator, lacked rider liability insurance. “You wouldn’t expect them not to have it. It just didn’t make sense,” she remarks. Despite contacting the company, no solution has been provided.

Forest’s terms require users to be at least 18 years old, but Sandy says the rider who hit her was under 16. “There’s little chance of recovering costs from him,” she notes. She also highlights that the company’s age verification failed, raising questions about how they can ensure compliance.

Forest is one of several e-bike hire services operating in London, with 20,000 bikes across the city. Councils are paid to manage these operators, with riders paying per minute to use the bikes. Their rollout has sparked debate over reckless parking and riding habits.

Sandy fears that time-limited promotions might encourage riders to speed. “Was he on a time limit? What made him go so fast he couldn’t stop?” she asks. She also criticizes councils for granting licenses without requiring insurance for incidents like hers. “You’d assume councils would enforce that,” she says, stressing the lack of accountability for companies.

Now, Sandy advocates for stricter regulations. She calls for government legislation to mandate insurance for all e-bike operators and urges councils to ensure coverage before issuing licenses. “If companies can’t track riders, they should still be responsible for the risks they create,” she concludes.