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Ontario boy severely injured in ATV rollover
October 14th, 2009 by Kurt Niland
As the Ontario Medical Association (OMA) pushes for legislation that would ban young children from riding all-terrain vehicles in the Canadian province, another boy has been severely injured in an ATV accident. According to The Observer of Sarnia, Ontario, an 11-year-old boy from Warwick Township, located just northeast of Detroit and Windsor, was driving an ATV unsupervised on private property when the accident occurred.
The boy lost control of the ATV, which the report described as an adult-size machine with a 660-cubic-centimeter engine. He was reportedly thrown from the vehicle and the ATV rolled on top of him, lacerating his legs. Emergency workers rushed the boy to Petrolia Hospital. He was later transferred to London Health Sciences Hospital, where he was underwent surgery for his injuries.
The injured boy was accompanied by another 11-year-old boy who was riding a dirt bike when the accident occurred. Both boys were wearing helmets. The boy on the dirt bike was not injured, according to the report.
The accident came just two weeks after another Ontario boy was killed in an ATV accident just a few miles away in Lambton Shores. In that incident, 7-year-old Kaedon Brown died when the ATV he was riding rolled over onto him.
Although some restrictions governing ATV use by children already exist in Ontario, the OMA says the present laws are inadequate. The association advises that no children under 14 years old should be permitted to drive an ATV of any size within Ontario.
Children 14 to 16, the OMA proposes, should be allowed to drive only low power ATVs incapable of exceeding 30 km/hour. The OMA says the rules should apply to ATV use on both public land and private property throughout Ontario.
Alluding to advertising tactics that portray off-roading as a safe and acceptable form of recreation for children, the association also asks “that the ATV manufacturers respond to medical community concerns and voluntarily discontinue their marketing to children without waiting for legislative restrictions …”
