(bright rock music)
Susan: Hi there.
I'm Susan Harris, educator for Nebraska Extension,
and we are going to talk about what size of ATV
is right for you.
If you ride ATVs as a family, for work, or recreation,
let's start with what is most important in our lives,
our kids and grandkids.
I really hope you'll set some rules.
This statistic will take your breath away.
Of all the kids under 16 who are injured in an ATV accident,
almost all of them were on an adult sized ATV.
The odds are not in your favor if you let a kid under 16
on an ATV in any way, operating it, or as a passenger.
One more statistic to prove that,
a whopping 56% of all youth fatalities
or deaths were under the age of 12,
most of them taking place on an adult size ATV of course.
When children drive an ATV,
their smaller body mass makes it harder to balance
the vehicle through weight shifting
and their hands may be too small to fully grip the handles
and operate the brakes.
Shorter arms and legs also mean less ability
to turn the vehicle or absorb shocks as well.
Kids can be launched off the ATV when hitting a bump
or a rut.
Even when they're tall for their age
or have operated ATVs growing up,
they still do not have the maturity to drive a vehicle,
and an ATV is a vehicle with much less to keep them safe
than a car has.
These size recommendations are important to know
and your local ATV dealer can help fit your child
with the correct size.
There are a few ways to be sure you have
the right size for a body.
Clearance between the ATV seat
and an inseam while standing on the foot rest
should be a good four inches.
Feet should be able to be flat on the foot rests
when sitting
and grip, throttle, and brake reach should be good,
even when turning, but wait,
there's one more thing to consider.
If your child is under 16
and easily fits an adult sized ATV, it's illegal.
It's not just a matter of size and fitting to the vehicle.
It's a matter of mental capacity and experience,
something younger people have not quite developed
sufficiently to react to situations
on high powered machines like this.
There is a reason it's against the law to operate an ATV
in Nebraska unless you have a driver's license,
many reasons actually.
I refer to this as my mountain scene,
created from data from DHHS that considers our ages
as we have traumatic injuries in Nebraska.
Green represents females and gray represents males.
See how the 10 to 15 year old bracket for girls
reaches its high point right there at that tender young age?
Well, for guys it keeps going up
but then it sharply declines at age 34.
The intriguing part of this graph is that the U shape
in the middle goes down in our parenthood years.
We seem to be safer,
but then it peaks again in the 55 to 64 year old bracket
for both women and men.
Why?
Well, maybe because, again,
it's those kids that are too young to be on adult size ATVs
having accidents and the guys are more likely to be
risk-takers when they're young
and in their early manhood on that side of the 'U'.
And then on the other side of the 'U'
we have an aging population of farmers and ranchers.
So just more people at that age are riding.
As we age, we lose reaction times
and physical skills we used to have.
And the big one is that we just become complacent.
We get away with stuff over the years and think less
and less about it until well, you know.
Mostly what I find as I travel the state
to educate about ATVs is that kids
and adults don't understand the physics of an ATV
and what situations make it so dangerous.
And many people don't take the time to be careful
until they've suffered some kind of devastating loss
or injury.
We don't want you to be a statistic.
So be sure to watch the next installments of this series
to be better informed and ATV aware.
I'm Susan Harris from Nebraska Extension.
Thanks for joining me.
(bright rock music)