Dashcam video captures terrifying e-bike and car crash, sparks calls for stronger laws
A teenage girl zooms down the middle of a road on an e-bike, staring at her phone with her helmet unbuckled. What happens next is tough to watch.
A terrifying head-on crash between an e-bike and car has sparked renewed calls for stronger safety regulations as the number of deaths and injuries from the devices continue to rise.
Footage published by Dash Cam Owners Australia – a popular channel on YouTube compiling car crashes – showed a motorist driving down a leafy suburb in New South Wales.
Seconds later, a young girl riding an e-bike turns the corner while looking down at her mobile phone not knowing the immediate danger in front of her.
The driver honks multiple times and comes to a stop in the middle of the road, but the girl only looks up when she is about 10 metres from the car.
She slams on the brakes but cannot stop in time and the e-bike crashes into the vehicle, with the young girl letting out an audible grunt.
The helmet she was wearing, which was not strapped on properly, falls from her head, and she tumbles off with her phone still in her hand.
“Oh my God,” she says after the collision.
The male driver warns the girl that the consequences could have been more serious.
“You gotta get off your phone. If I come around there I could’ve killed ya,” he says.
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In the past five years, at least 40 Australians have lost their lives in e-bike and e-scooter related crashes, with the most recent on Thursday.
An eight-year-old boy was riding his e-bike on a path at Mountain Creek in Queensland’s Sunshine Coast when he collided with a teenager also on an e-bike.
The primary school boy suffered critical injuries and later died in hospital. The high-school teen refused treatment and is assisting police in the investigation.
One in three fatalities have involved children.
Before Thursday’s tragedy, the youngest reported deaths were Khye Brickell who was on an e-bike when it collided with a car in Mill Park, Victoria, and Summah Richards who fell onto the path of a car in Laidley, Queensland, while also on a motorised bike.
Both were aged 12.
Alarmingly, there have been more than 12,000 reported injuries in the past five years, according to an investigation by News Corp earlier in October.
The dashcam vision has alarmed experts and local mayors who are rallying for change to state and federal regulations in a bid to reduce deaths and injuries.
Australasian College of Road Safety’s chief executive Dr Ingrid Johnston told news.com.au that the footage of the girl highlighted the reason why regulations need to be tightened.
She said it needs to begin with “having nationally consistent rules” around the controversial electric devices to alleviate any confusion between jurisdictions.
“It’s around the devices themselves and how fast they can go. How much they can weigh, what they can be like and making sure that they can’t be tampered with,” Dr Johnston said.
“Then there’s the speeds you’re allowed to go. There’s where you’re allowed to be riding it. Is it on the road? Is it on a footpath? Is it on a shared path? Is it on a bike path?
“And how fast you’re allowed to go in those different contexts – should it be different if you’re on a footpath compared to if you’re on a bike path?
“There’s all sorts of areas where we need to be getting this consistency, making sure that everyone is wearing helmets, making sure that you don’t have really young children on these e-mobility devices so we need to get that consistency and really tighten up these laws.
“This is an area where really technology has progressed so quickly we’re trying to catch up to make sure that the guidelines and regulations around them are appropriate.”
Rules on e-bikes
All states and territories have mandated maximum assisted speed of e-bikes to 25km/h before the motor cuts out, while illegally modified ones can reach up to 50km/h.
In all jurisdictions, you cannot use a phone while riding a bike. The mobile has to be fixed to the bicycle and cannot obscure your vision.
Helmets are also a legal requirement for all riders, even for kids on training wheels or riding as a passenger in a bike trailer.
But restrictions around riding on a footpath and the legal speed differs.
In NSW and Victoria, the practice is banned, while it is capped at 12km/h in Queensland, 10km/h in WA and SA, and 15km/h in Tasmania and the ACT.
The law around riding on the road also varies across the board.
Dr Johnston said improvement on data collection relating to deaths and injuries – which is currently showing an “increasing trend of trauma” around the country – is crucial.
“Well, one of the problems that we have is that the data is not very good. So, we at the moment are really relying on data from individual states, even from individual hospitals, to show us the trends,” she explained.
“What we really need is a good national picture so that it’s not just individual hospitals. It is across the country where we are able to identify what is the type of mobility device the person was on, let alone, where did it come from.
“We’re a long way from having that level of detail.”
Fighting for change
E-bikes – usually fitted with a small electric motor – have grown more than 10 times in popularity, rising from fewer than 10,000 bought in 2017 to more than 100,000 in 2022 alone.
Local mayors across the country have been trying to rally for change to legislation in a bid to get in front of the industry which is expected to be worth $159 million in 10 years time.
Gold Coast Mayor Tom Tate sent a letter to Queensland Premier David Crisafulli in September pleading for action, saying dangerous manoeuvres by e-bikes and groups of riders blocking traffic are “creating a significant public safety issue”.
“The Gold Coast is contributing to Queensland having the highest number of e-bike incidents in the country which troubles me greatly and I know it will trouble you,” the letter read.
Mayor Tate wants to see licences for riders, bikes to be registered like cars, mandatory speed compliance by manufacturers, fines for reckless and illegal behaviour, and the ability to compound a bike for serious or repeat offences.
The mayor was not available to speak to news.com.au, but Acting Mayor Mark Hammel told this publication the dashcam video of the girl’s crash is a “pretty damning indictment” on e-bikes.
“I think the first point of call is the ability for some of these vehicles to get into the country in the first place, so for state and federal government to acknowledge the sooner they cut the supply coming into the country the better,” he said.
“We then need to be looking at fairly significant education campaign for the ones that are legal to have here and that people can be using that.
“Should they be speed limited to make sure especially when they’re on footpaths or around pedestrians, reducing the chance of impact.”
Mayor Hammel also flagged there has been debate in council around whether the Queensland government had to amend its legislation to give more power to councils to police e-bikes.
Meanwhile, NSW Police has been conducting blitzes across the state this year.
Just last month it launched Operation Shore Safe, a high visibility taskforce of officers who will ensure roads and footpaths are safe between Central Coast to Port Stephens.
It is aimed to “promote safer behaviour” in busy areas from October to February, the warmer months when more people are out and amid the rise in electric mobility device use.
Speaking to news.com.au, Port Stephens Mayor Leah Anderson said she welcomed the crackdown, but argued it needs to happen more often to ensure the public are safe.
She echoed the remarks of Dr Johnston, saying more data has to be collected to determine how serious the issue is and what areas police and governments have to focus on.
Mayor Anderson also threw her support behind having one set of national rules for electronic devices.
“I think that would provide consistency and if people are going on holidays and they’re chucking their e-bikes in the back of the car and heading over a border somewhere, they don’t need to be worried about, ‘well do I need to Google now what I can do in this state?’
“As a council we do support cycling and e-mobility cause we're a tourist and recreational area, but we just encourage visitors and residents to follow the rules.”
A push for change has also reached the federal level.
Independent MP Dr Sophie Scamps in September introduced the Safer E-Bikes Bill 2025 to federal parliament which would address safety issues of imported devices.
The reform will aim to ensure e-bikes are “fit-for-purpose and safe in terms of accepted international safety standard, anti-tampering provisions and speed capability”.
Dr Scamps said e-bikes are “vital” to the shift to “cleaner, more active transport”, but the technology has raced ahead of safety and import regulations.
Her main concern at the federal level is that imported devices do not have to meet mandatory, safety or quality standards as they are not considered road vehicles.
“We frequently have e-bikes that are more like motor bikes than bicycles being used on our roads and our footpaths,” she said.
“Parents, pedestrians, state politicians, trauma surgeons, and even police are all calling for leadership from the federal government to address these pressing safety concerns.”
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