I have had so many close calls, there is not enough time in this day to tell you about them all!
But the time I hit that ghost dog was one of the closest

 

Probably the time I ran over a cattle dog on my '87 KTM at night. This particular dog had never had a go at me on the way out but at night he decided to have a go. With engine driven lights I had to pop the clutch while braking to keep lights going and not stall the motor. A few tank slappers and I managed not to end in a nearby culvert. What save my butt was 300mm suspension travel and good ground clearance.Iin retrospect if I hadn't braked he would have only snapped at my back wheel and none of the above would have happened.

gammac

 

I ride normal, and within my skill set, I don't take chances. And I have people that care about me so that's a great motivator that keeps me from doing anything stupid. The Honda ST1300 I have is so fast it's scary!! All of that being said, those are the things I can control, however what I can't control is the stupid Texting and other idiots out there that pay no attention to what is around them. Or the dog on the side of the road or the deer that jumps out, the loose gravel that I might not see, so with so much out there, who know what will happen. I don't have any near catastrophic situations to tell of, and I wan't to keep it that way.

 

"I know nothing!" (my favorite quote)

Since I too ride on the roads, I like lots of breaks to freshen my mind during riding. Too many good times to think of the bad possibilities out there that may or have not happened.

 

I guess getting caught in a snow event on my ninja. I was in Missouri heading back to KS on my 01 6r. I even looked at the weather before I left and they werent callin for snow. Luckily it was a wet snow and the well traveled roads were just wet, maybe a lil slush. My front intake was packed with a lot of snow that it wouldnt idle. I made it as far as my grandpas house which was 2 miles from my house. I had to push it to his house cause I just couldnt get traction anymore. I had a lot of weird looks from people on the road haha.

 

Haven't had any near-death experiences on my motorcycle, but had two in life..

One I was surfing hurricane waves on Cape Hatteras, NC. I duck-dove a big'gun and the force of the wave ripped my leash off.. That was my flotation device. The water was very rough.. 10-15ft waves, white water, red flags on the beach.. I was caught in the white water and couldn't get to the surface. I tried and tried and I was fading quick. I popped up and managed to yell "HEELLP!".. First and only time I've ever yelled for help. I thought I was done.

I went under again, and that's when I remember getting very calm. Everything went silent. I remember thinking in my head "Man, I feel soooo goood.. I should just take a big breath of water - it might feel good" I was totally at peace with dying right there.. Very weird.

Anyways, I don't remember anything after that. My buddy somehow got to me and fished me out. I woke up on the beach with the coast guard standing over me reviving me. They yelled at me after I woke up. hahahaa.. I had a few drinks that night.

Another time - I was flying an airplane solo in VFR conditions. It was a hot summer day, and I was heading back to the airport to land.. I saw that the entire horizon was covered with a low-laying cloud layer that started at about 1,500ft above ground, to about 5kft. I had to go that way, so I decided to fly under it (my mistake).

So I got underneath it and all was well.. But then the ceiling was steadily dropping, so I kept descending so I could see the ground. I realized I was too low when I looked down and saw someone mowing their lawn - looking up at me like "WTF is he doing". I was at 800ft above ground, couldn't go lower.

Then the clouds descended on me.
It looked like someone used a paint roller to paint all my windows white.

I gave full throttle, watched attitude indicator and art. horizon, and pulled back climbing as fast as I could. In that two mins or so of climbing, I felt like the plane was rolled to the left a bit. but my AI said I was level nose up and climbing. Could have sworn I was rolling a little... Your senses get all messed up when you're flying blind. If I went with my instinct who knows what would have happened...
After about 3 or 4 mins of climbing, I popped out above the clouds, relieved as hell.
that was scary. Statistics said I should have panicked and had an impact with the ground within a minute or two. Good thing I beat that statistic

Those were it for me. Hope to never have another one

 

Well, since I've only ridden them as used bikes when I sold bikes and when I rode my brother's VFR, I'd have to say the closest I got was when I got on one, started it up and rode it...

Of course my odds of dying weren't too huge since nothing eventful happened any time I rode one, but you asked a goofy question and I gave a goofy answer.

I just don't really care for these kinds of questions, they just promote the whole concept of why non-riders call motorcycles "murdercycles" and the riders "organ doners", when they read something where riders actually recount occurances making them attributable to motorcycles and especially sportbikes.

The only time I've almost killed myself it had to do with my screw ups, nothing about the bike, just me. And yes I did screw up big time when I missed a double jump sticking the face of the second one. If you want the blood and guts, sorry there wasn't much blood... it was in a ruptured lung that almost killed me by drowning in fluids, although for the gore hounds I understand blood was trickling out of my mouth. Otherwise I'd have got up and walked away if I hadn't shattered a vertebra and had a bone chip pushed against my spinal cord, causing paralysis in my legs. I tried the jump, my fault, no one elses and not the bike. Enough?