Northwest Cycle Report

After four long months of surgeries and rehabilitation, Spokane Police Sergeant Rick Dobrow – who was critically injured last September in a collision with a minivan while on his motorcycle – is back on the job.

On Tuesday, September 26th, 2006 at just after 5 p.m. the “Officer Down” call went across the airwaves. Sergeant Dobrow was on his motorcycle and had just accelerated to catch up with a reckless driver when a mini-van pulled out into traffic in front of him.

“I had enough time to see and realized the only thing I could do is reduce the speed I was traveling,” Dobrow said during an October, 2006 interview.

Sergeant Dobrow laid down a skid mark dozens of feet long but still plowed head first into the van, crushing the side door with his body.

“Broke a couple of ribs, fractured three vertebrae, broke my shoulder, broke my shoulder blade,” Dobrow said.

The collision totaled Sergeant Dobrow’s Kawasaki motorcycle and had nearly did the same thing to him and he was rushed to Sacred Heart Medical Center, where he stayed for ten days.

One month later he was recuperating at home and walking with the help of a cane. On Wednesday, however, he was back at work, much to the surprise of some of his fellow officers. He’s on light duty as his shattered jaw and face bones need more time to heal before he heads back out on the street, but that hasn’t stopped him from going back to supervising the department’s traffic unit, a group of officers who try to prevent collisions like the one that nearly killed him.

“We know that that through aggressive traffic enforcement we can reduce serious injury collisions and fatalities and that’s what we do as a traffic unit,” he said.

Dobrow credits doctors and the love of his family with his recovery but this crash has also taught him a lot about the public he serves.

“I felt not only support from the law enforcement community because that was expected but what I didn’t expect was the support from the community overall and that really touched me,” he said.

He added that in light of his injuries he wished residents in North Idaho who ride without a helmet to rethink their decision.