The machine was too much for the boy.
Tate Johnson died when he lost control of the ATV he was driving and the machine rolled over on top of him on a family farm near New Hartford in September. The 9-year-old weighed about 65 pounds. The ATV weighed 10 times that.
Such tragedies have occurred at an alarming rate in Iowa this year. At least five children — four of them ages 8 to 12 — have died in all-terrain vehicle accidents since May.
That compares with 22 such deaths involving children in Iowa from 1982 through 2009, the most recent year for which data are available. Overall during that span, children under age 16 accounted for 20 percent of the 108 ATV fatalities reported in the state for all ages.
Safety advocates nationwide are pushing for bans to keep younger children from driving ATVs, generally described as four-wheel machines capable of speeds up to 50 mph. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that children who are not licensed to drive a car should not be allowed to operate off-road vehicles.
The industry is pushing back, stressing proper training and gear and use of machines that are the right size for the rider’s age.
Tate’s mother, Leah Johnson, wonders whether more restrictions on ATVs might be needed.
“It’s scary how many deaths there are,” she said. “He was riding (an ATV) that was too big for him. It was a leisure ride. It wasn’t anybody’s fault, but maybe there should be stronger regulation.”
State and federal safety officials are begging Iowa parents to get training for children who use the vehicles.
“You can’t be a 100-pound teen trying to slap 600 pounds around and win all the time,” said Alex Filip of the Consumer Product Safety Commission. “It’s unfortunate that all these kids are dying.”
Most Iowa accidents involve rollovers, or someone driving into a culvert, pole or cable while riding in ditches along rural roads.
The latest deadly crash came Oct. 4, when 12-year-old Dillon Hooyer of Sioux Center was driving a one-seat ATV with a 5-year-old companion on board.
Hooyer lost control, hit a utility pole and died. His young passenger was thrown from the machine but survived.
In July, 10-year-old Brandon Mangels, a horse enthusiast who loved to work on his family’s dairy farm near Blue Grass in Scott County, drove too fast on a road on his way to close a gate. The machine rolled, landing on Mangels’ neck.
Charlcey Ann Bowen, 8, a gymnast who liked to ride horses, died in May after the ATV she was driving near Kellerton hit a pile of gravel, rolling the machine.
No plans in Iowa to ban young riders
There are no plans to ban youths from riding ATVs in Iowa, said David Downing, who follows ATV issues for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.
Massachusetts last year banned anyone under 14 from operating ATVs, part of a package of tougher ATV regulations. The move was prompted in part by an ATV crash that killed an 8-year-old.
Scott Wolfson, a Consumer Product Safety Commission spokesman, said his agency isn’t trying to stop people from riding ATVs, as some critics contend.
“It’s the government saying we’d like to see you stay alive,” Wolfson said. “We are talking about life-altering head injuries,” often caused when small riders don’t have enough weight to properly steer the machine.
Plus, other off-road vehicles, similar to dune buggies, are gaining popularity, which may lead to even more injuries, he said.
The commission’s staff visits families after tragic accidents. “We have sat across from too many parents who have lost a child,” Wolfson said. “We would plead with parents not to allow children on that adult model.”
Simply making sure kids ride the right size of ATV, get training, and avoid taking passengers would reduce the number of deadly accidents, he said. Nationally, ATVs have been linked to 600 to 800 deaths annually involving riders of all ages and about 130,000 injuries a year that require an emergency room visit, the commission reported.
Both the federal government and nonprofit safety groups say injuries and deaths involving ATVs are underreported.
Mother of victim pushes safety issues
Sue Rabe of Turner, Ore., helped found the nonprofit Concerned Families for ATV Safety after her 10-year-old, 80-pound son died in 2002 when a 500-pound ATV designed for adults rolled over when he hit a rut. The machine suffocated him.
The group wants youths under age 16 banned from driving ATVs.
“Right now, the big thing is stability issues,” Rabe said, and key factors include the weight of the machines and their speed. “But the cost would be enormous to fix them, so the industry ignores it.”
Many kids instinctively hold on to the machine during a rollover, increasing their chances of being crushed, she said.
Her son regularly wore safety gear and was a trained rider. But she didn’t realize then that he should have been on an ATV sized for kids, rather than an adult-sized ATV.
“I realize I made a big mistake,” Rabe said. “Unfortunately, you don’t get ‘do-overs.’ ”
ATV accidents cost hundreds of millions of dollars a year nationwide in expenses related to treatment of injuries and deaths, Rabe said.
“There’s a reason we don’t let kids behind the wheel of a car,” she said. “But we let kids operate all of these big machines that go fast at age 6.”
Industry stresses more training
ATV industry groups say increased emphasis on training, proper gear and machines sized for the rider’s age would do more to assure safe riding than increased regulation. The industry also is looking at designing machines with speed controls.
Pete terHorst, spokesman for the All-Terrain Vehicle Association, said banning youths from driving ATVs altogether would only make it more dangerous for them to ride adult-sized machines as they get older, because they would lack experience.
“Tens of thousands of families throughout the country recreate responsibly together every year on ATVs,” terHorst said.
Iowa ranked 29th among the states in the number of ATV-related deaths for all ages from 1982 through 2009.
Iowa has placed more emphasis on safety in recent years, the DNR’s Downing said.
“We were obviously going up in the early 2000s,” he said of Iowa ATV accidents. “What’s happened since is conjecture, because the reports (for 2010 and 2011) aren’t in yet.”
The Iowa DNR helped create a network of eight ATV parks, most in former mines or quarries, in hopes of keeping the machines off hiking trails.
The parks are run in cooperation with the Iowa Off Highway Vehicle Association and have a number of safety rules: The machine must display registration, and riders must wear helmets. No one under 12 can operate an ATV there, and those under 18 must have completed safety training.
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Source: http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20111025/NEWS/310250053/0/NEWS09/?odyssey=nav|head
