This one hits too close to home...

Some very dear friends of ours lost their 15 year old son this weekend in a tragic UTV accident. A 14 year old girl was driving with the 15 year old and a 7 year old boy riding inside when she took a turn too fast and rolled the vehicle. All were ejected as none of them were wearing seatbelts. The 15 year old was pinned beneath the vehicle and sustained injuries that resulted in his death.

My oldest boy played baseball with this kiddo and his mother served on the local Little League board with me. It's a tragic example of how fragile life truly is. Don't take it for granted.

Crazy how often this same story is repeated. Always the same. UTV, teenager, turned too fast, pinned under it. Hate to hear it every time!

Terrible. Prayers to all involved.

Honestly…they should have an age limit on driving ATVs and UTVs. And, there should be a penalty on parents (same way we are going with gun / shooting legislation).

Yes, I know this sounds extreme but this happens what too much.

TFAAGG said:

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Honestly…they should have an age limit on driving ATVs and UTVs. And, there should be a penalty on parents (same way we are going with gun / shooting legislation).

Yes, I know this sounds extreme but this happens what too much.

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Add golf carts to the list

I don't necessarily disagree but both of my daughters have learned to drive on my Polaris under extremely strict supervision. They always wear a seatbelt and have an incredibly low speed limit I impose. A UTV supervised and on a location where almost no harm can be inflicted on or by a third party, is a great tool for teaching.

ttha_aggie_09 said:

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I don't necessarily disagree but both of my daughters have learned to drive on my Polaris under extremely strict supervision. They always wear a seatbelt and have an incredibly low speed limit I impose. A UTV supervised and on a location where almost no harm can be inflicted on or by a third party, is a great tool for teaching.

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I agree. We have Mule Pros which I think helps some. They don't excite the heavy foot very much.

ttha_aggie_09 said:

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I don't necessarily disagree but both of my daughters have learned to drive on my Polaris under extremely strict supervision. They always wear a seatbelt and have an incredibly low speed limit I impose. A UTV supervised and on a location where almost no harm can be inflicted on or by a third party, is a great tool for teaching.

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Operative words being speed limit and supervised.

Tons of kids, literally some as young as 7-8, zip around my neighborhood without any supervision on golf carts. Several similar close calls, one day there will be one of these true tragedies.

Damn shame because they can be a fantastic way to introduce safe driving skills.

bkag9824 said:

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ttha_aggie_09 said:

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I don't necessarily disagree but both of my daughters have learned to drive on my Polaris under extremely strict supervision. They always wear a seatbelt and have an incredibly low speed limit I impose. A UTV supervised and on a location where almost no harm can be inflicted on or by a third party, is a great tool for teaching.

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Operative words being speed limit and supervised.

Tons of kids, literally some as young as 7-8, zip around my neighborhood without any supervision on golf carts. Several similar close calls, one day there will be one of these true tragedies.

Damn shame because they can be a fantastic way to introduce safe driving skills.

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There is something about golf carts that give people a false sense of security, doesn't matter if they are adults or kids, always see people doing stupid things in them.

Marauder Blue 6 said:

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TFAAGG said:

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Honestly…they should have an age limit on driving ATVs and UTVs. And, there should be a penalty on parents (same way we are going with gun / shooting legislation).

Yes, I know this sounds extreme but this happens what too much.

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Add golf carts to the list

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And cheeseburgers. More folks die from the ill effects of eating poorly. We should make a law requiring a doctor's note to eat anything other than a salad with grilled chicken. Maybe some laws about regular cokes and iced tea with too much sugar. And don't get me started on the video games these kids play. Man, could we use some laws there.

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And cheeseburgers. More folks die from the ill effects of eating poorly. We should make a law requiring a doctor's note to eat anything other than a salad with grilled chicken. Maybe some laws about regular cokes and iced tea with too much sugar. And don't get me started on the video games these kids play. Man, could we use some laws there.

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I know this was an attempt at edgy wisdom, but it is lame.

There is a spectrum of developmental safeguards and our society has learned the hard way that certain activities need to be delayed until proper training while others should be outlawed all together.

Drinking at 18 vs 21? Debatable

But you could have thrown drinking and driving into your rejoinder but you didn't. Why is that?

You could have put legalizing fentanyl in your rejoinder but you didn't. Why is that?

You could have argued for 12 years girls being eligible for marriage but you didn't.

etc. etc. etc.

The world is not a black or white libertarian pipe dream.

Plenty of kids die per year riding horses. Are we going to start putting a legal age limit on riding horses? What about the families who let their kids race motorcross? Are we going to charge them with child abuse if their kid gets hurt racing?

I think there shouldn't be any legal action taken. Everybody wanting to make everything illegal and being sue happy is why our society is getting so soft. That girl is going to have to live with killing her friend for the rest of her life and so are the parents, that should be enough of a punishment along with all of the civil suits that are most likely going to happen.

The problem with this theory in relation to the tragic event that just happened, is that people are generally very risk prone even at the ages we deem acceptable. Heck, in the story that was just mentioned, the kid was 15 and was probably already driving on the highway legally with a permit. 16 year olds unfortunately have accidents all the time in regular vehicular accidents and we don't hold parents liable. I took more risks when I was legal driving age than I did on a ranch at 13. Lawsuits just destroy more lives. Just my 2 cents.

Windy City Ag said:

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The problem with this theory in relation to the tragic event that just happened, is that people are generally very risk prone even at the ages we deem acceptable. Heck, in the story that was just mentioned, the kid was 15 and was probably already driving on the highway legally with a permit. 16 year olds unfortunately have accidents all the time in regular vehicular accidents and we don't hold parents liable. I took more risks when I was legal driving age than I did on a ranch at 13. Lawsuits just destroy more lives. Just my 2 cents.

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So I agree with this partly. I was more taking aim at the poster taking the reductio ad absurdum tack by equating motor vehicle safety with outlawing cheeseburgers. There is of course a gray area like swimming pools causing drowning deaths that will always be debatable . This is probably a grey area.

But at some point we can admit that things like seat belts and airbags in cars, put in due to regulation rather than the good intentions of car companies, save lives. I view motor safety laws as a separate thing because the dumb actions of one negatively impacts others. We would not have drinking and driving laws if 100% of the resulting deaths were just idiot drivers killing themselves. We have them because idiot drunk drivers run more often run into a minivan and kill a family with young kids.

So protesting any sort of restriction out of principle does not make sense to me

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100% incorrect.

Why? Because look at the post that started this particular offshoot of the conversation. Kid unfortunately dies, the knee jerk reaction is to state that we should have laws preventing kids from being able to do X activity that resulted in a kid - one out of how many thousands and thousands that ride UTV's every day - driving one. It's an emotional response and not completely rational.

My kids have put several thousand miles on my Mule Pro around the neighborhood. I'm not exaggerating - I think I have around 4700 miles on my Mule and my daughters have at least 3500 of them driving around the neighborhood. And while the Mule may not have the get up and go that a Polaris or others do, it still tops out at 47-48 mph and most of the accidents happen at speeds well below that.

Did I worry about them? 100%. But I also spent a lot of time driving with them at first teaching them a few things and hammering on them about speeds and turns and what not, and the first few times we set them free they had a pretty limited range on where they could go. And it certainly made it much easier to learn to drive an actual car for my oldest, and will be the same for my youngest now that she is at the age I have to look at driver's ed again.

Accidents like this suck, no getting around it. But the answer to an accident isn't to look at everybody else and say "you get punished for it". That's what gun control is, and we typically frown upon it on this board. To lobbying for any sort of restriction out of principle or emotional feels does not make sense to me.

Damn, went form a PSA to make sure you supervise, manage, and coach your kids not to do dumb things (smart, and a good reminder) to banning everything dangerous and scary (dumb and lazy).

Windy City Ag said:

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Fair enough but I still think you are skirting my point a bit.

Are you ok with three wheelers being effectively banned?

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Not really. I like the markets to make decisions instead of governments or busy bodies with little else to do with their time personally.

The town where I grew up is small (400 ppl), very rural and UTV's are very popular. In the last decade, 3 people under the age of 20 have been killed in separate accidents.