A care assistant who was cycling to work was injured, including losing four front teeth, in a collision with a car parked in a cycle lane on Grange Road in Dublin last week — the motorist, who was in the car at the time, drove off leaving the cyclist unconscious.
The cyclist, Carlos Leao, says he gained consciousness again in an ambulance last Tuesday, January 23. His last memory before falling was thinking he made contact with the car door mirror.
The incident happened on Grange Road in Baldoyle between Abbey Park and the Applegreen filling station where the cycle track is highly segregated with bollards but there are gaps for driveways.
Speaking to IrishCycle.com this afternoon he said it was raining and windy. He said: “I couldn’t avoid a collision as the car was parked with the front of the car facing the cycle lane [against traffic direction].”
The car he says was parked halfway in the cycle lane and the other half on the footpath. The car was black according to Leao who said that the driver didn’t even have the car’s indicators on.
“I just remember that I think I hit the mirror of the car and I just woke up in the ambulance,” he said. “I think the paramedics gave me adrenaline or something like that, as I just woke up. And then I realised I had an accident. The last thing I remembered was this car in the middle of the cycle lane… and he [the driver] was inside the car with somebody else.”
As well as losing four front teeth, had surgery to correct bones around his gum, cut his mouth and fractured his elbow. He’s not sure if he’ll need more surgery. While he was in hospital his friends sent up a GoFundMe page to cover costs.
He said a witness told him that the driver just left without calling the emergency services.
A spokesperson at the Garda Press Office said this afternoon: “Gardaí are investigating a road traffic incident which occurred on 23rd January 2024 in Baldoyle, Dublin 13. A male cyclist (30s) was taken to Beaumont Hospital where he received medical treatment. His injuries are understood to not be life-threatening. Investigations [are] ongoing.”
Anybody with any information or camera footage should contact Raheny Garda Station.
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The car should have been wearing Hi-Viz!!!
Seriously though, get well soon Carlos <3