Were it not for a helmet, Sir Richard Branson, CEO of Virgin Airlines, would have been a goner by now. He was in a near-fatal biking accident on Monday that his life flashed before his eyes.
Branson provided more details of the accident on Friday in his Virgin blog, admitting he thought he was going to die.
While biking on Virgin Gorda in the British Virgin Islands with Holly and Sam, his adult children, and with friends to train for the Virgin Strive Challenge, as he was cycling downhill toward Leverick Bay, Branson hit a hump in the road head on.
“The next thing I knew, I was being hurled over the handlebars and my life was literally flashing before my eyes,” People quoted the aviation tycoon. His head flew first toward the concrete road, causing his cheek and shoulder to take the brunt of the impact. The first person who saw him was his assistant Helen Clarke, who found him lying prostate on the road, he recalled in his blog.
As a result, photos he shared on Twitter showed a badly damaged cheek, red bruise on the upper right part of his face and above the lips and a neck brace. He added his knee, chin, shoulder and his body were severely cut.
His bike flew off the cliff and disappeared, and when recovered, it was totally destroyed. Despite the wounds and road spill, Branson was not paralyzed by the accident. X-rays and scans at Miami showed Branson suffered from a cracked cheek bone and torn ligaments.
Despite the accident, Branson intends to compete in the Virgin Strive Challenge in September where participants hike, bike and run for charity over one month that begins at the base of Matterhorn and ends at the top of Mt. Etna in Sicily. The challenge aims to raise £1.5 million for Big Change that supports innovative projects which arm the youth with necessary tools to thrive in life.