According to Troy Police, Dacin was out riding ATVs with her flight instructor Saturday night when she hit a cement pad just before 1 a.m., causing the rollover. Dacin was ejected from the vehicle and hit her head. The ATV then landed on top of her.

Dacin was taken to Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, where doctors pronounced her dead just before 2 a.m. The Oakland County Meidcal Examiner’s Office said the official cause of death was head trauma. Dacin was not wearing a helmet when the accident occurred.

Dacin’s friend, Tracy Freeland, who graduated from Utica High School with her in 2006, said that Dacin liked to ride motorcycles and had considered joining the Air Force.

“She was a wild child. She just wanted to laugh and have fun,” Freeland told the Free Press. “She wanted to fly.”

Police are currently investigating whether alcohol played a factor in the ATV crash.

According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, 816 ATV-related fatalities occurred in 2007, the agency’s most recent annual estimate. The federal government does not include side-by-side vehicles such as the Yamaha Rhino and certain Polaris models in its ATV estimates, so the fatalities linked to all off-road vehicles would be much higher.

The Free Press report says that Dacin was driving a quad, which the driver straddles – an ATV according to government classification.

The CPSC has reported a 53 percent increase in the number of ATV deaths from 1999 to 2007. The agency also estimates that about 135,000 people were treated in emergency rooms for injuries caused by an ATV crash, compared with 81,800 in 1999 – a 65 percent increase. One-fifth of all ATV deaths involved children.

SOURCE: Yamaha Rhino Rollover › ATV rollover kills 22-year-old student pilot

The boy’s parents told authorities they did not know the boy had taken the ATV and that they began to search for him “within several minutes.” They found the boy just after 7 p.m. trapped in the water underneath the overturned vehicle. The parents administered CPR until emergency medical help arrived.

Maryland’s Office of the Chief medical Examiner has ruled the boy’s death to be an accidental drowning.

Authorities say the boy was found wearing a helmet. According to the parents, he was allowed to ride the Polaris ATV, but they told authorities the ATVs had been put away for the night.

The investigation remains open, though Police have stated that it appears no laws were broken.

Maryland law prohibits children under 12 years to operate ATVs on public land, but there are no restrictions for ATV use on private property in the state.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has evaluated the safety standards for ATVs as established by the Recreational Off-Highway Vehicle Association and found that they do not “adequately address the deaths and injuries associated with ROV rollovers and collisions.” Inadequate lateral stability, undesirable steering characteristics, and insufficient occupant protection during rollover crashes are some of the characteristics that make the vehicles so dangerous, the CPSC says.

In a statement last October about the dangers of ATVs, Inez Tenenbaum urged parents to keep their children off of ATVs.

“I urge all riders and passengers to strap on a helmet, use the seat belt, know the terrain, and never allow anyone under 16 to drive these vehicles,” Tenenbaum said.

Polaris touts its line of child-oriented vehicles with the tagline: TOUGH ATVs FOR TOUGH KIDS

SOURCE: Yamaha Rhino Rollover › Maryland boy drowns after ATV rollover

According to the boy’s older brother, Garret left to take out the trash and drove the ATV around a barn located about 75 yards from the family’s home. The brother went to look for Garrett after he failed to return for about half an hour. After the boy found his brother pinned underneath the overturned Polaris, he ran back to the house to tell his father what had happened.

When first responders arrived at the farm about 1 p.m., they found that the boy’s father, Christopher Malone, had lifted the ATV off of his son and was performing CPR on him.

Medics airlifted the boy to Christus St. Michael Hospital in Texarkana, where he succumbed to his injuries.

The staggering number of children who die each year in ATV-related accidents is one of the reasons propelling major changes in the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission’s governance of off-road vehicles. Earlier this month, the CPSC announced that it had found a draft of safety standards proposed by the Recreational Off-Highway Vehicle Association (ROHVA) “did not adequately address the deaths and injuries associated with ROV rollovers and collisions.”

CPSC Chairman Inez Tenebaum, a staunch child safety advocate, urged all ATV drivers and passengers “to strap on a helmet, use the seat belt, know the terrain, and never allow anyone under 16 to drive these vehicles.”

According to Concerned Families for ATV Safety, more than 40,000 children are seriously injured and killed in ATV accidents every year.

SOURCE: Yamaha Rhino Rollover › ATV rollover kills Arkansas boy

Earlier this week we featured J.T. Crow, a 9-year-old boy who died when the Yamaha Rhino he was a passenger in rolled onto its side, throwing him from the ATV and pinning him underneath its unpadded roll cage. Since the accident, which occurred in June 2007, J.T.’s mother, Heidi Crow, embarked on a mission to “help save others from a tragic fate like J.T.’s.”

ACCORDING TO THE PRESS RELEASE: One result of Ms. Crow’s work is the “Citizen Report on UTV Vehicle Hazards,” a compilation of information, statistics, and evidence underscoring the dangers of the Yamaha Rhino and other utility terrain vehicles (UTVs). Ms. Crow collaborated with family members of other Rhino victims, the Trauma Foundation, and the Center for Auto Safety in publishing the report, which is dedicated to the memory of J.T.

“The Yamaha Rhino and some of the other sport-based UTVs have a much greater propensity to roll over than any passenger vehicle or truck on the road,” the report states in its opening. “There are, however, no governmental minimum safety performance standards currently applicable to these vehicles,” the report says.

The authors believe that “such standards are vitally important to prevent occupants from being seriously injured during rollover. Yamaha Rhinos lacking adequate occupant protection have injured, maimed or killed literally hundreds of consumers.”

The report was released to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), the Recreational Off Highway Vehicle Association (ROHVA), and key members of Congress.

“Utility Terrain Vehicles have fallen within a regulatory crevice. These vehicles were introduced to the market and have been sold to consumers without having to meet government safety and performance standards. It is imperative that federal and/or state safety agencies step forward to protect consumers from the growing number of fatalities and severe injuries,” said Ms. Crow in releasing the report.

The report focuses on the safety defects of the Rhino that make it one of the most dangerous UTVs in the world. It also identifies 38 people who lost their lives in Rhino accidents.

“A national tragedy is occurring. Scores of adults, teenagers, and children have been left permanently disabled after their hands, arms, feet, and legs have been crushed in Yamaha Rhino rollovers, and many innocent children have been killed,” Ms. Crow said.

“We call upon Yamaha and other UTV manufacturers to incorporate key safety features necessary to protect occupants from accidents, injuries, and deaths.”

The report calls for many improvements to the Rhino, including better occupant containment methods so that passengers remain inside the vehicle during a rollover; supplementary safety restraints such as partial doors, padded roll cages, and netting; effective seat belt restraint systems that comply with US Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards; improved stability and handling; and other safety upgrades.

The entire report can be viewed here.

SOURCE: http://www.yamaharhinorolloverandrecall.com/news_articles/2009/20090227-press.htm

SOURCE: Yamaha Rhino Rollover › Families devastated by Rhino rollovers release safety report