This September 2023 report by staff at the US Consumer Product Safety Commission compiles injury and fatality data involving micromobility devices, using data that was available at the time of publication. As the report notes multiple times, the aggregate data is fairly coarse and CPSC staff could only follow up on so many reports.

Nevertheless, the report offers some rather interesting insights on e-scooters, hoverboards, and ebikes, although at 42 pages, some might prefer to just read the Executive Summary – which is just 4 pages – and skim the figures and tables.

Some of my takeaways from the report:

• ER visits for e-scooters have been at least double that of ebikes, although ebike data was below the reporting minimum so that data was estimated (page 10)
• E-scooters and hoverboards ER visits by female/male are 35%/65% and 55%/45%, but ebikes are disproportionate at 24%/76% (page 12)
• Two-thirds of hoverboard ER visits are for 5-14 year olds, the largest group of any age range for any micromobility device (page 13)
• The vast, vast majority of ebike ER visits were incurred while riding on a public road or public property. No surprise there. (page 14)
• July has the most ebike ER visits (14% of annual total), and January/February the least (3% each of annual total) (page 15)
• The report has a whole section dedicated to e-scooters, starting at page 17
• One-third (32%) of treated e-scooter injuries indicated the rider was carrying or holding onto something, with 61% indicated not holding, and 7% unspecified (page 21)
• 13% of treated e-scooter injuries indicated the rider was wearing a helmet, with 51% unspecified (page 22)
• Between 2017 and 2022, using available data, CPSC found 104 deaths related to ebikes. These deaths skew heavily male (84 deaths) and 25+ years old (87 deaths) (page 23-24)
• 58 of 104 ebike deaths involved collisions with motor vehicles, the leading cause. The data does not specify whether the ebike or motor vehicles or both were in motion at time of collision (page 25)
• 8 of 104 ebike deaths involved pedestrian collisions, composed of six pedestrians and two ebike riders
• 2 of 104 ebike deaths involved fire by the ebike batteries
• 18 of 104 ebike deaths involved collisions with terrain, roadway features, or wayside obstacles (page 25)
• Of 59 ebike injury reports that CPSC staff followed up, 28 identified fire hazards, the leading cause. 24 of 59 involved non-brake mechanical issues, such as bicycle components failing or detaching (page 28)