Okay, ( – not that anyone else wants to rehash those debates, either – ), I am not here to claim that helmets fall into that “false security that gets you in over your head and thus is actually the-opposite-of-safety-gear category”, since we do not tend to experience skinned-heads that keep us in line along the way, until it is too late (and since what can skin a head can rattle and thus bloody a brain… whereas, IN-ternal knee injuries are clearly less common in skating than they are in field sports). But I do wish that the legal environment in this country were such that we could have long ago gone to stovepipe helmets of sorts, with a 5″ diameter hole on top, and one inch or less of flare-up around that hole, (that you could tie streamers/bolos/what-have-you around, to, you know, make-up-for/complement how ridiculous a “shortstack” helmet might otherwise look)… because those at least’d be LITERALLY cool, with more head heat escaping. Since we don’t ever slam the very tops of our heads (unlike bikers who go over-the-handlebars), at least never on pointy surfaces, (and the inch or less shortstack would protect one from all but pointy objects), that’s a helmet that one could get away with being at least literally (somewhat) cool in, as it would allow a lot more head heat to escape than a regular helmet. But, the first time a kid got a conventional side-of-the-head injury in one that would have happened in any helmet, and his non-skating parents sued, the jury might be oblivious to the differences between biking and skating, and put the manufacturer out of business. Still, I’d love to see a skate helmet manufacturer stand up and say “screw the ninny state, we’re making this”.
2 comments
Cave Dweller
Okay, ( – not that anyone else wants to rehash those debates, either – ), I am not here to claim that helmets fall into that “false security that gets you in over your head and thus is actually the-opposite-of-safety-gear category”, since we do not tend to experience skinned-heads that keep us in line along the way, until it is too late (and since what can skin a head can rattle and thus bloody a brain… whereas, IN-ternal knee injuries are clearly less common in skating than they are in field sports). But I do wish that the legal environment in this country were such that we could have long ago gone to stovepipe helmets of sorts, with a 5″ diameter hole on top, and one inch or less of flare-up around that hole, (that you could tie streamers/bolos/what-have-you around, to, you know, make-up-for/complement how ridiculous a “shortstack” helmet might otherwise look)… because those at least’d be LITERALLY cool, with more head heat escaping. Since we don’t ever slam the very tops of our heads (unlike bikers who go over-the-handlebars), at least never on pointy surfaces, (and the inch or less shortstack would protect one from all but pointy objects), that’s a helmet that one could get away with being at least literally (somewhat) cool in, as it would allow a lot more head heat to escape than a regular helmet. But, the first time a kid got a conventional side-of-the-head injury in one that would have happened in any helmet, and his non-skating parents sued, the jury might be oblivious to the differences between biking and skating, and put the manufacturer out of business. Still, I’d love to see a skate helmet manufacturer stand up and say “screw the ninny state, we’re making this”.
michael
Can you come and teach the rest of the STOP-safety training classes at WARN Industries which I am required to attend?