A coroner has issued fresh safety warnings about riding e-scooters after a 14-year-old girl died. The teenager died after she crashed into a bus on the road.
Fatima Abukar died on March 21 while riding her privately owned e-scooter. She was wearing no safety equipment when she rode onto the road in East Ham and travelled alongside the minibus. She hit the bus and fell beneath its wheels.
East London senior coroner Graeme Irvine has now written a report on Fatima's death and the dangers of riding e-scooters, which has been sent to Home Secretary Suella Braverman and Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley. In the report, he described how Fatima died of "catastrophic head injuries".
The report said that fatalities from e-scooter crashes more than doubled after police forces changed their policy to confiscate fewer of the devices. In his report, Mr Irvine wrote: “Since 2019 there have been eight recorded fatalities involving e-scooters in London and 31 in the country at large. At the time of her death, Ms Abukar was riding a privately owned e-scooter on a public highway.
“Despite the ubiquity of such devices on London’s streets, riding them on public roads is unlawful. Whereas approximately 4,000 unlawfully used scooters were seized by the Metropolitan Police Service in 2021, only 1,100 were confiscated in 2022.
“The reduction is attributable to a change in policy introduced in November 2021. An inverse correlation exists between the rate of legal enforcement and the rate of deaths caused by e-scooters.”
Private e-scooters are banned in the UK but are often used on public roads and pavements. However, some towns and cities in England are trialing the use of rental e-scooters in a scheme which has been extended until May 2024.
Mr Irving noted that not all e-scooter manufacturers or retailers give customers written warnings about their illegal use. He added that “where such warnings are present, often they are not prominent". The coroner sent his report to major retailers.
