Surgeons want quad bikes banned for under 16s

Surgeons want quad bikes banned for under 16s – NZ tech save lives

The Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS) is urging the New Zealand and Australian Governments to ban the use of quad bikes by children, following the latest death of a young girl in New South Wales.

Minute-by-minute rider behavior data from more than 30,000 quad and side-by-side rider-days on farms and remote locations in Canada and New Zealand indicate a quad bike rider may experience a serious incident or roll-over every 3,400 days.

Keith Oliver, Chairman at Blackhawk, the company that has captured and analysed this quad bike big-data, said this 3,400 day statistic may not be a worry for an individual rider “however with an estimated 300,000 quad bikes across Australia and New Zealand, the data indicate there is likely to be 90 potentially serious incidents a day across both countries, most going unreported, but some will result in serious injury or death”.

Mr Oliver said that if banning quads for under 16’s is not practicable or socially acceptable then providing on-quad technology to monitor and mentor rider behavior in real-time will save lives. “The technology used in the 30,000-day monitoring study also senses quad accidents and roll-overs in real time, sending emergency alerts via satellite to family members and neighbours. Quad accidents detected in real-time on ski-fields in Canada and remote farms in New Zealand resulted in emergency alerts going to family members and co-workers, they responded within minutes to roll-overs, saving lives within the golden-hour” Mr Oliver said.

Mr Oliver also encourages all parents in NSW and Victoria with quad bikes to protect their loved ones, young or old, by enrolling in their states’ generous Worksafe quad safety rebate programmes, where $7M of grants and subsidies are available for active-rider training courses and safety equipment.

Image: video of quad bike roll-over courtesy Worksafe Victoria
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqD2fkKv_Dg

NSW programme: $1M
www.safework.nsw.gov.au/health-and-safety/safety-topics-a-z/quad-bikes

Victoria programme: $6M
www.vff.org.au/quadbike

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