\u201cThis death therefore was entirely preventable.\u201d<\/p>\n
The name of the girl and all details which would identify her family have been permanently suppressed.<\/p>\n
Bike used to mow thistles<\/p>\n
Coroner Ryan said the girl lived with her parents on the farm and would often ride as a passenger on the bike as her father drove it around the property. <\/p>\n
On March 23, 2024, her father was using the quad bike to mow thistles in a paddock, with the girl sitting on a plywood platform across the back seat.<\/p>\n
She was wearing a full-face motorcycle helmet but had no other protective clothing.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt one point, as [the father] was driving in a straight line at around 5km\/h, [the girl] fell backwards off the quad bike and was run over by the mower,\u201d Coroner Ryan said.<\/p>\n
The father stopped the bike and lifted the mower off his daughter, helped by another family member who was nearby.<\/p>\n
The girl was in a \u201cdire condition\u201d and the two men did what they could to stem the bleeding from her wounds. <\/p>\n
Emergency services reached the rural property about 26 minutes after being called, and a paramedic assessed her and confirmed she had died.<\/p>\n
She had suffered \u201cmultiple injuries\u201d.<\/p>\n
Coroner Peter Ryan suppressed the girl’s name and identifying factors. Photo \/ RNZ, Conan Young<\/p>\n
An investigation found nothing wrong with the bike, but the plywood tray on which the girl was sitting could be lifted about 12cm on the left side. <\/p>\n
A large cable tie holding the plywood onto the bike\u2019s frame on that side had snapped. <\/p>\n
There were no handholds on the side of the frame and a warning label on the right mudguard of the bike said it should not be used to carry passengers.<\/p>\n
The girl had ridden on the bike frequently, but never before when the mower was attached and being operated.<\/p>\n
Bike may have hit rough ground<\/p>\n
The crash analyst considered that the girl probably fell backwards when the bike hit a rough patch of ground and the plywood board moved.<\/p>\n
The lack of a handhold on the left side of the frame meant she would not have been able to prevent herself from falling.<\/p>\n
\u201cI appreciate children love to be involved with their parents particularly working on farms, and that generally they do so in a safe environment,\u201d Coroner Ryan said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut a young child riding unrestrained on an inherently unstable vehicle such as a quad bike cannot be described as being in a safe environment. <\/p>\n
\u201cI note there is no suggestion [the father] was driving the quad bike in a reckless manner; he was driving slowly and in a straight line.<\/p>\n
\u201cNevertheless, due to a combination of factors [the girl] fell from the bike,\u201d the coroner said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis demonstrates the inherent danger of allowing young children to ride as passengers on quad bikes being utilised to perform farming tasks.\u201d<\/p>\n
In suppressing the family\u2019s identities, Coroner Ryan cited evidence about how family members were struggling to come to terms with what had happened.<\/p>\n
He said it would be \u201cunjust\u201d for the family to suffer further serious distress, which would be likely to adversely affect their mental health, through the publication of their identities.<\/p>\n
Ric Stevens spent many years working for the former New Zealand Press Association news agency, including as a political reporter at Parliament, before holding senior positions at various daily newspapers. He joined NZME\u2019s Open Justice team in 2022 and is based in Hawke\u2019s Bay. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"His report comes with a warning to the rural community \u201cof the dangers young children face while accompanying…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":175866,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[49384,1081,74,1561,3595,12629,3233,6868,1976,42,78,1452,112821,43,1523,8145,40,38,41,39,1455],"class_list":["post-175865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-49384","tag-accident","tag-after","tag-bay","tag-by","tag-coroner","tag-farm","tag-girl","tag-hawkes","tag-headlines","tag-in","tag-issues","tag-mower","tag-news","tag-over","tag-run","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-warning"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175865\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/175866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}