High-Profile Bike Deaths in the News Lately

Picture: Reuters

"The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" author dies

SALMON, Idaho (Reuters) - Stephen R. Covey, author of the bestselling motivational book "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People," died on Monday at an Idaho hospital from injuries he suffered in a bicycle accident in April, family members said in a statement. He was 79.

Picture: Hebrew U.

Neuroscientist Shlomo Bentin killed in bike accident

Friday’s bicycle accident on Bancroft Way resulted in the death of 65-year old Shlomo Bentin, a globally recognized expert in cognitive neuropsychology, who was in Berkeley as a guest lecturer at the university.

Bentin was injured in an apparent collision between his bicycle and a dump truck on Bancroft, just west of Fulton, at 3:38 p.m. on Friday. He was taken by ambulance to Highland Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Berkeley police are still investigating the accident.

Bentin received the prestigious Israel Prize on Israel Independence Day this April, in a ceremony attended by Israel’s president, prime minister, Supreme Court president and other national leaders. The prize cited Bentin’s “important scientific contributions to the field of psychology and the science of neuropsychology in particular”.

Bentin, who was Professor in the Department of Psychology and a member of the Interdisciplinary Center for Neural Computation at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, contributed to the study of the functional differences of the brain’s hemispheres, and was considered one of the leading researchers of reading in Hebrew. His work had “vastly influenced the evolution of reading instruction in Israel,” according to the Israel Prize Committee.

Agent Who Nabbed Vanunu Killed in Accident

Giora Weiss-Tzahor, who headed the Mossad operation that located nuclear spy Mordechai Vanunu so he could be brought to justice, was killed in a bicycle accident Monday. Tzahor, who was 70, was crossing a road between two agricultural fields on his mountain bicycle when he was hit by a truck. He was taken to Hillel Yafe Hospital in Hadera where efforts to save him failed.

Israeli newspapers are not publishing his photograph even after his death.