A CORONER urged yesterday that users of quad bikes should always wear crash helmets. This followed the evidence about a teenage boy killed in an accident on a farm.
Darren Shanahan (14), from Garrane near Cashel in Tipperary, died of a fractured skull after falling from the quad on April 14th last year.
Clonmel Coroner’s Court yesterday heard that Darren had taken his quad bike out onto a “level field” on his father’s farm and was not wearing a helmet at the time of the accident.
When he did not return home, his father and mother went searching for him and found him lying beside the upturned vehicle.
Quad bikes are all-terrain four-wheeled motorised vehicles increasingly used in farm work, including rounding up animals, but are also popular for leisure and sport.
Darren’s father Gerry told the inquest that when he found Darren “he was lying on his back”.
The inquest heard Darren’s mother Geraldine made efforts to resuscitate her son, but to no avail. A postmortem later revealed that Darren had suffered a fractured skull.
Gerry Shanahan told coroner Paul Morris they had bought Darren an expensive helmet for the quad bike, but that he was not wearing it on that particular evening.
The dead boy’s parents appealed yesterday for drivers of quad bikes and all such vehicles to “always use a helmet”.
An inspection of Darren’s quad following the accident found that the vehicle was “in good working order”.
However, evidence was given that the inspection revealed that one of its rear tyres was flat.
Mr Morris said it was unclear if this could have contributed to the accident, which he described as an “awful tragedy”.
Mr Morris said that it could not be known if a helmet would have definitely saved Darren’s life, but that all users of such quad bikes should wear a helmet while driving them.
The inquest heard that the field in which Darren was using the quad bike was completely level and had no big drops or furrows or stones.
The jury of six men returned a verdict of accidental death in accordance with the evidence.