This is sad to me because it would appear that this fatality was preventable. 1.) 100 feet of skidding could have been 100 feet of swerving. Why didn't he just ride around him? 2.) You can almost stop from 60 mph in 100 feet using proper braking technique. Even if you don't stop, you should be able to drop your speed by at least 40 mph. Assuming he was going 70 and the truck had at least accelerated up to 30, all the rider needed to do was shave 40 mph off his speed to avoid the wreck. That would have been easily accomplished with proper braking. 3.) The helmet in the picture is a small half helmet and the dent in the back of the pickup isn't massive. After braking for 100 feet and the fact that the truck was accelerating away, my bet is that the final closing speed impact was less than 30 MPH. A quality helmet and gear would have likely saved the mans life.
Obviously we don't really know but it sure looks like the rider just stomped on the rear brake and steered the bike straight into the back of the truck. At a minimum, we know that the rider didn't try and swerve as that skid mark is perfectly straight and leads right to the impact.
Take aways from my perspective. 1.) Never stop riding the bike. You best action is to ride around the obstacle. Look where you want to go and go there. 2.) Practice emergency braking and get really good at it. You don't want to be learning how to do it when you need to be executing it perfectly. 3.) When you do go down, you want good gear on. The only way to make this happen is to wear good gear.
I hate to speak ill of the dead but I believe that If the rider had been good at even one of these 3 things, they'd still be alive.
PS...we don't know....but the new plates might mean a new rider. If so, that would explain why they weren't good at evasive maneveurs and emergency braking as those skills take a bit of time to develop and a MSF class helps, but most riders don't leave there proficient in those skills.