Memorial ride for Danielle Naçu

The clearly marked bike lane in which the cyclists rode.

Joy here...A lot has happened since my last post.  I wrote in August about riding with a three of the victims of a crash involving a van and five cyclists who the media have dubbed "The Kanata 5."  I've now met and befriended four out of these five cyclists who were out on a Sunday morning ride on July 19, 2009, riding in single file in the clearly marked bicycle lane when a mini-van drove over all five of them before fleeing the scene.  In the past two years since that fateful day in July, these five cyclists have picked up and carried on.  They are strong, resourceful, and remarkable.  And on October 11, 2011 the trial for the driver of that van began.  He was charged with five counts of dangerous driving and five counts of leaving the scene of an accident causing bodily harm.

The front of the van that hit the "Kanata 5" on
July 19, 2009.

I was sitting with three of them and their family members and friends awaiting the start of the trial as the jury was being chosen off in another room in the courthouse in downtown Ottawa.  We felt strange and nervous; none of us had been involved in a criminal trial, and so there was so much that was simply new about the process, and as we sat there, we fiddled with our iPhones and felt awkward.  And then the news  came in that at around 9am that very morning, a commuting cyclist who was riding down a main street in downtown Ottawa was hit by the opening door of a parked car, which threw her into the road where she was hit by a car and ultimately killed.  As I read the news update out loud to all of us sitting there, awaiting the start of the trial, our stomachs sank.  We were saddened.  We were disgusted.  We were angry.  And we were sickened.

We later learned that the cyclist who was struck and killed was a 33 year old civil servant who worked with another one of our friends (the one whose tire popped on our epic 100km ride back in August).  She could have been any one of us.  She was young; she was smart; she had her whole life ahead of her.  And simply because someone getting out of a parked car didn't bother to check over the shoulder to see if there was a cyclist coming, this young woman died on a street in the middle of downtown Ottawa.

Her name was Danielle Naçu, and I never met her.

Rest in peace, Danielle Naçu.

But when a memorial ride was planned for the following Tuesday to mark her death, I planned to go before heading back to the courthouse for the ongoing trial of that van driver.  And while I first thought I would be able to ride in solidarity with the hundreds of cyclists - Danielle's family, friends, coworkers, and those who didn't know her but were moved by this tragedy - in the end, I stood by the side of the road and watched the procession.  There were yellow balloons, yellow roses, yellow T-shirts, and yellow armbands all in memory of Danielle, a woman whose favourite colour was yellow, and who offered a ray of sunshine to all who knew her.  I stood there with the hundreds of people who walked or rode that stretch of road, stopping where she was killed to listen to her brother address the crowd.  I stood amidst the ringing of bike bells, more solemn and more rich than any pealing church bells signalling the passing of a life.

The local news, like the Ottawa Sun and the Ottawa Citizen, as well as the national news, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (the CBC) all covered the story of Danielle's tragic end and the ride to remember her.

I'm not a journalist, and I'm not a member of the media.  I didn't know Danielle, and before last summer, I probably wouldn't have really considered myself a cyclist, but I do now, and I care about the safety of our roads.  Here's my short video of that day that should work on mobile devices (at least I filmed it on my iPhone, and this is the first time I've felt it's important enough to share my own little video with others):

Over and out,

Joy