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Visually Impaired Patriots Experiencing the Road to hold its fifth annual motorcycle ride

by Erik S. Hanley from https://www.jsonline.com A motorcycle ride supporting veterans with disabilities is rumbling through Oak Creek later this month When T.J. Oman, a retired Navy lieutenant commander in Wisconsin, reached out to a fellow veteran in Minnesota about the fifth VIPER ride, he learned the man had been diagnosed with cancer and had months to live. VIPER, or Visually Impaired Patriots Experiencing the Road, will hold its fifth annual motorcycle ride on Aug. 22 in Oak Creek at the Oelschlaeger-Dallmann American Legion Post 434, 9327 S. Shepard Ave. The Minnesota man has traveled to the Milwaukee area for every past VIPER event, but his sister was keeping this year’s announcement from him because of his diagnosis, Oman, one of the VIPER ride founders, said. “I messed up her plans because when I didn’t see his application this year, I put together an email and sent it to a batch of people curious about their absence,” Oman said. Now that he knows the ride is happening, despite his diagnosis, that veteran is coming to ride. Motorcycle owners, known as “pilots,” are partnered with a veteran called a “tailgunner.” The duos stay together throughout the day’s events. Volunteers are known as the “groundcrew” and they work to give directions, welcome participants, set up food and drinks, clean up and more. “We’re looking forward to it this year because we missed it last year,” said John Carter, a former Marine and co-founder of the VIPER ride. The 2020 ride was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. Initially only for blind veterans, the ride recently became “the VIPER ride plus+” expanding to allow veterans with any physical disability that prevents them from operating a motorcycle. There is no cost to participants. “We don’t charge anybody a dime, this is not a fundraiser,” […]

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Mechanics with good eyesight bring motorcycles for me to fix – Abugu, blind mechanic

from https://thecitizenng.com/ Mr Emeka Abugu is a blind mechanic who specialises in fixing motorcycles and generators. He discloses in his workshop in Aji, Umu-Ida in the Igbo-Eze North Local Government Area of Enugu State, how he lost his sight and learnt to fix motorcycles and other things. Excerpts: How did you become visually impaired? I was not born blind; it was when I was five years old that I had measles. And because of that, I could not go to primary school. Is your visual impairment partial? No, I don’t see anything. I am completely blind. At some point, it was partial and like I told you, I wasn’t born blind. It started getting worse gradually and it was around 1992 that I went completely blind. You repair motorcycles, generators and bicycles, how did you learn to do that? I didn’t learn it; I started by repairing bicycles in 1993. Three years after, I started repairing motorcycles. I started by fixing tyres and gradually, I started repairing engines and doing wheel balancing. I also work on electrical parts. My father bought the tools I use for me. It is difficult to believe you didn’t learn how to fix motorcycles and bicycles… I cannot explain it because nobody taught me. My father had a similar gift; he repaired his bicycle. He would go to market, buy the needed spare parts and fix his bicycle. But he never repaired for any other person. He had tools that he used and sometimes, I used the tools to fix his bicycle when I was a kid. I used to also make a kind of local basket popularly called ‘Abor’ or ‘Nkata’. Apart from motorcycles and bicycles, I also fix generators. Could you identify the kinds of motorcycles you can fix? I repair different kinds