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It is 100 % the hunter fault They must not shoot if they can't see.
In my area they must put signs up at the start of each tracks to say they are hunting there.
Lots of accidents every year . Last year a grandfather shot dead his grandson.
Does their love of blazing away with shooters from Sept explain why they close the lifts early?
What a mess though, it’s not like the Alps is a small place, can’t they hunt away from people?
A few years ago, riding in Finale Ligure our run down to the accommodation above Calice we passed through a line of hunters most nights on the Roller Coaster trail. Apparently, they were after wild boar. It was a bit disconcerting right enough when you here of this.
They heard me with the hope pro 2 hubs right enough 🙂
I guess we could mass spam the Morzine tourism office, to enquire whether we should be wearing bullet resistant body armour from now on - instead of downhill armour. The threat of a loss in tourism income is probably the best way to sort this.
You sound like a defensive gun nut
You have formed that opinion based on what exactly?? The fact I thought the article was stating fact in exactly the same way as the guardian did in your link?
Or was it the fact I went on to state clearly the shooter should go to prison
Do you actually read stuff before forming an opinion?
FYI.. I personally think that it's ridiculous that you can shoot a gun in a publicly accessible place, guns should be banned for public use. You don't need to hunt to eat in France.. It's a blood sport, nothing more. Feel free to interpret that however you want as well
I've been to morzine several times and never realised this was even a risk.
Yeah, sorry Tpbiker - you aren't.
All good fella.. I think we are both on the same side of the argument on this one
It will make me think twice about the French alps as a biking destination again tbh. Is this confined to a set period of the year, of is drunken Frenchies blasting anything that moves a year round pastime?
Guardian article mentions that it is 2 weeks since another hunter was jailed for shooting a trail runner dead with a single shot to the head.
Around 20 deaths per year in France, apparently, which included people in their gardens.
From thelocal.fr
<i>ARCHIVE Photo: AFP Picture dated 29 August 1996 of 90-year-old Anna Chaillard, still an active boar hunter walking with her dog Titi in the surroundings of Huanne, central France.</i>
I think it's a bad idea to allow any non professional leisure use of firearms in public spaces. If you want to shoot guns, go and do it in a closed, indoor range.
The words ‘ hunting tradition’ keeps coming up in articles, which is the standard excuse for continuing the practice of something which belongs in the past..
In fact is there any tradition which is worthwhile? Im struggling to think of one...?
The words hunting tradition should be preceded with a c not a h! I still can't believe it goes on!
I've no problem with hunting for food or controlling numbers, if there is a level of satisfaction/enjoyment taken in that pursuit, then that's fine with me also. Just like fishing for me.
However something is very wrong with the rules and regulations if this sort of thing happens regularly, looks like there has been plenty chances in the past where something could have been done to avoid this death. Tragic.
Eddie, you should be setting your shot up, so that it doesn’t pass over tracks that other people may be using and you should ALWAYS know exactly where your round is going to land and if it misses the target, it should not continue on for hundreds of meters. You use your surrounding geography as a backstop.
If that means you can’t bag your deer, then so be it.
The cyclist won’t be in the wrong here, hunters have a duty of care.
@ryanwomble - You've not been to France in hunting season then!
edit - I agree with you about the wording of the Mirror article, it does seem to make you infer a certain point of view.
Around 20 deaths per year in France, apparently, which included people in their gardens.
I awoke early one morning at my in laws in the Perigord to find a man in the back garden about to shoot a cat.
I asked him what he was doing (it was obvious, so I deserved the reply), which was " i'm shooting a cat".
Upon further inquiries in pigeon french, I think he said that he hadn't asked permission because he didn't want to wake anyone up. He was holding a shotgun!!!
In the two years I've lived here I have only once seen warning signs for the chasse.
They do have rules about when and where they can hunt, but like a lot of laws in France, a lot of French people don't think they apply to them.
You would think that during the height of summer and in an area recognised as being used by folk on bikes, you should be ok. But I always wear something bright and if I can, I check the area out first for small white vans and the sound of dogs barking.
We’re recently back from a week with the guys at Riviera-which coincided with the start of the hunting season. It was a total eye opener. While we were there a 19year old boy was killed whilst walking his dog by a guy hunting for wild boar. The most extraordinary thing is no one seemed to be that bothered about it-just like it was an everyday occurrence. Delving into just how many people are killed in France and Italy every year made me realise one thing....I’m so glad we had guides who, knowing the locals were keeping us well out of the shoot areas. There’s no way I’d be riding those forested trails solo during hunting season, no matter how awesome they are.
We’re recently back from a week with the guys at Riviera-which coincided with the start of the hunting season.
We went out there a few years ago and I thought it was shocking how many spirit bottles where surrounding every hunt shelter/vantage point we passed.
Thankfully they steered us well clear of any areas where they were shooting.
We’re recently back from a week with the guys at Riviera-which coincided with the start of the hunting season
Not being hunting season doesn’t seem to bother them. Out riding in the woods near the in laws, I came across a group of armed and drunk gentlemen who all stopped talking and stared at me. I said Bon matin and rode off as fast as my fil’s early 90s Giant (coldrock?) would go, in a zig zag pattern just to be on the safe side? You know they aren’t going to do anything to you because you have seen them hunting out of season but your imagination goes into overdrive, in a kind of ‘Le Deliverance’ kind of way!
Full osprey vests and kevlar lids for the interseason riding then.
My brother used to live in the Charente region and used to ride with the local school teacher. The school teacher used to ride around singing in woodlands because he said the Chasse would shoot anything that moves.
'Soyons Tous Prudent' is often the mantra and on the signs it's 'Soyez Prudent' : It's always interested me how I am told to be careful by an old guy with a gun.....but that's how it is.
Unfortunately they have just halved the cost of the licence...a move to keep voters on board....did I say that?.....
Anyway, the mayor of Montriond has just banned hunting...momentarily.....which is interesting...
Article in the Dauphine Libere reports all this then has an editorial type comment at the end which could be construed as saying it wasn't the hunters fault: "No exact advice but just a question of common sense whilst the hunt is open"
From the Dauphine Libere website: a poll
A tragic accident occurred on Saturday in the town of Montriond, while a fight was organized by a handful of members ACCA (Association communal hunting official) of Montriond. mountain biker down a track at the edge of a wood was fatally shot by a 22-year-old hunter. Should we ban hunting on weekends? share your opinion
78% said yes to the ban.
(Google translate by the way...)
It's not as if they manage to shoot many boar either!! Friends husband goes twice a week (most teachers are only at school 4 days a week in France) during the season and judging by how little meat is in their freezer spends all day drinking and walking the dogs with his mates.
I’ve come across hunters in the woods, in the Charente a couple of years ago - bloody scary it was.
I’d entered the woods on little piece of singletrack and was about 1km in before I spotted them. Weirdly they were all wearing high viz! I was in all in black on my black Rumblefish so not as visible as them.
I made a serious amount of noise - (good job I have a bell), much to their disgust and went hell for leather out of there, down through the main track. At the exit on the main track there was guy sitting in his car blocking the track with signs advising the hunters were in the woods.
Apparently round by us they can’t hunt on a Wednesday afternoon as that is school half-day.
Kinda curtails the riding from Oct to Feb a little bit.
The a previous case that sets precedent for this is a 1 year jail sentence that was just handed out to a hunter in similar circumstance, whether or not that is fair or not I am not sure as it sounds like the shooter is going to have a much harsher sentence in his own head for the rest of his life on top of any custodial one.
RIP to the rider, hopefully this might be the straw that breaks the camels back and brings about some change. It's a stupid thing to have happening and probably many lives ruined from a single shot.
Guys,
Let's keep comments on track. I feel we are verging into unecessary, insulting and inappropriate terrain.
Has the guy been named?
Is he "one of us"?
I feel we are verging into unecessary, insulting and inappropriate terrain.
AKA France
Hunting goes on all over the Med; my agent in Cyprus proudly showed me his photos of all the songbirds he had blasted out of the trees, lined up on the ground.
Wasn't there a French or Italian pro cyclist who was also shot while hunting some years ago?
Is he “one of us”?
He was was named on Welsh news last night.
I’m finding this thread to be STW at its distasteful worst. There are likely to be people on here who knew him - have some respect.
I feel we are verging into unecessary, insulting and inappropriate terrain.
Where's the harm in a little casual racism?? Mind you, if these comments were made about coloured people there would be outrage..................
Where’s the harm in a little casual robust historical analysis?
Fixed that for you :p
But yes, inappropriate now.
Doesn't just happen in France. I stopped at road junction in the Chilterns once, and was mildly alarmed when I found out I was one field away from an advancing shoot driving pheasants my way! No signs anywhere*Got moving pretty bloody quickly when shot started to land on my helmet!
Fixed that for you :p
No you haven't you are still a racist little sh1t promoting pathetic stereotypes......
No signs anywhere*Got moving pretty bloody quickly when shot started to land on my helmet!
By the time the shot is coming down like that it's fairly harmless, they will also be aiming skywards not along the floor or into woods.
Brexit will keep us safe.
Mike, oh for sure, I didn't even realise what it was at first, and it wasn't until a shot literally bounced off my helmet onto the road in front of me that I realised what it was. Still didn't hang about though!
Racism
Not really, - more like embellishment of history and theatrics.
Remember Vichy France had majority support in 1940 and …
The key component of Vichy's ideology was Anglophobia.[14] In part, Vichy's virulent Anglophobia was due to its leaders' personal dislike of the British, as Marshal Pétain, Pierre Laval and Admiral François Darlan were all Anglophobes.[15] As early as February 1936, Pétain had told the Italian Ambassador to France that "England has always been France's most implacable enemy"; he went on to say that France had "two hereditary enemies", namely Germany and Britain, with the latter being easily the more dangerous of the two; and he wanted a Franco-German-Italian alliance that would partition the British Empire, an event that Pétain claimed would solve all of the economic problems caused by the Great Depression.[16] Beyond that, in order to justify both the armistice with Germany and the Révolution nationale, Vichy needed to portray the French declaration of war on Germany as a hideous mistake, and the French society under the Third Republic as degenerate and rotten.[17] The Révolution nationale together with Pétain's policy of la France seule ("France alone") were meant to "regenerate" France from la décadence that was said to have destroyed French society and brought about the defeat of 1940. Such a harsh critique of French society could only generate so much support, and as such Vichy blamed French problems on various "enemies" of France, the chief of which was Britain, the "eternal enemy" that had supposedly conspired via Masonic lodges first to weaken France and then to pressure France into declaring war on Germany in 1939.[17]
No other nation was attacked as frequently and violently as Britain was in Vichy propaganda.[18] In Pétain's radio speeches, Britain was always portrayed as the "Other", a nation that was the complete antithesis of everything good in France, the blood-soaked "perfidious Albion" and the relentless "eternal enemy" of France whose ruthlessness knew no bounds.[19] The chief themes of Vichy Anglophobia were British "selfishness" in using and abandoning France after instigating wars, British "treachery" and British plans to take over French colonies.[20] The three examples that were used to illustrate these themes were the Dunkirk evacuation in May 1940, the Royal Navy attack at Mers-el-Kébir on the French Mediterranean fleet that killed over 1,300 French sailors in July 1940, and the failed Anglo-Free French attempt to seize Dakar in September 1940.[21] Typical of Vichy anti-British propaganda was the widely distributed pamphlet published in August 1940 and written by self-proclaimed "professional Anglophobe" Henri Béraud titled Faut-il réduire l'Angleterre en esclavage? ("Should England Be Reduced to Slavery?"); the question in the title was merely rhetorical.[22] Additionally, Vichy mixed Anglophobia with racism and antisemitism to portray the British as a racially degenerate "mixed race" working for Jewish capitalists, in contrast to the "racially pure" peoples on the continent of Europe who were building a "New Order".[23] In an interview conducted by Béraud with Admiral Darlan published in Gringoire newspaper in 1941, Darlan was quoted as saying that if the "New Order" failed in Europe it would mean "...here in France, the return to power of the Jews and Freemasons subservient to Anglo-Saxon policy".[24]
So when Tpbiker asked why they put their guns down, if you read around the subject a bit....you'll see that I quite rightly pointed out it was because a lot of them at the time were fascist leaning anglophobic anti-semites who cared about their economy and way of life above all else and were prepared to put up with the situation that they found themselves in.
That's not to say they are like that now - but I do see parallels in today in terms the pan-European fascism that was taking root at the time and the inexplicable support among far right parties like the Lega Nord and AfD for the European Union now etc.
You forgot ukip there trollboy!
The French only like fighting when it involves shooting unarmed peasants in far east Asia and North Africa.
Sorry, but your statement is propogating pathetic racist stereotypes, have you forgotten WWI, the free French army etc, etc............................
Two years ago,whilst road biking in North Corsica,came around a bend in the road,to be confronted by a bloke in camouflage,standing in middle of road,armed with a rifle,with telescopic sight.Then,a short distance further,another one,then again,another one.Four in total,probably hunting wild pigs or boar.Since 2000,350 people have been killed in hunting accidents in France,and between 100 and 150 wounded annually,during hunting season.
Apologies for derailing the tread with my dickish comment. Written out of anger at the situation but inappropriate all the same.
This news is uncomfortable reading for me for 2 reasons, firstly I have ridden on those trails, and secondly I hate guns and bloodsport.
No excuse though.
Hunting occurs in the UK too. Cycling up through a forest on a private estate in the Brecon Beacons a friend and I met twenty or thirty blokes dressed in camo. they told us that their guns were loaded and that they were waiting for their dogs to flush out a fox or two.
Likewise, stalking season in Scotland involves firearms. However, neither of the two scenarios occur on 'public' land where there is always free access- I think.
I'm pretty certain that I have ridden where Marc Sutton was shot, dropping down from Super Morzine to Montriond. IF it is where I think it is, I seem to recall that there are small signs dotted around that give the permitted times and dates of hunting. They are not warning signs however. Even if they were warning signs though, it would not be the rider's fault in the event of an accident, surely.
Just like fishing for me.
I think the worst you could do if you made a mistake fishing would be to stick a hook in someone. Guns in public places are for trained, accountable pros who observe proper safety procedures, not punters.
Guns in public places are for trained, accountable pros who observe proper safety procedures, not punters.
If only we could apply that to cars.
When all said and done, the hunter obviously wasn't able to see what he was shooting at - which seems like the minimum requirement when you are shooting at something - particularly when on public land.
Will be interesting to see what happens to the shooter - a large part of that towns summer income comes from cyclists (one would assume).
My thoughts are with the family and friends of the poor bloke shot whilst cycling in the woods. I had no idea how lax the attitude to hunting was in France. The best outcome here would be an uproar from other cyclists, walkers, climbers etc refusing to visit the area. Hit them where it hurts which, sadly, is in the wallet.