Boy on ATV slams headfirst into tree

LINCOLN – A 10-year-old boy was in serious condition at a Bangor hospital Sunday after the ATV he was driving went off the trail and he slammed headfirst without a helmet into a tree.

Wyatt LaBlonde, address unknown, was in an intensive care unit at Eastern Maine Medical Center after a LifeFlight helicopter flew him there from Penobscot Valley Hospital in Lincoln Saturday afternoon, a PVH spokeswoman said.

According to Lincoln police Officer Richard York Jr. and state Game Warden Bruce Loring, LaBlonde and a friend were driving all-terrain vehicles on Houston Road near Long Pond at about 4 p.m. Saturday when LaBlonde suddenly went off the road and hit a tree.

His friend went for help, and LaBlonde’s parents, who were not from the area, took him to the Lincoln Public Safety Building, where firefighters treated him briefly until an ambulance arrived and took him to the hospital, the investigators said.

LaBlonde was breathing but fading in and out of consciousness at the station, York said. Although he might not have been traveling very fast, the boy was not wearing a helmet, according to York and Loring. State law requires any ATV rider under age 18 to wear a helmet and be supervised by an adult, Loring said. Failure to do so could result in a $100 fine for the rider or his guardian, he said.

But Loring didn’t know Sunday whether the boy’s parents would face the fine.

“We’ll see what happens when we get to that point in the investigation,” Loring said. “It depends on how close to him they were when the accident occurred.”

The accident was the second investigated by Loring this weekend in the Lincoln Lakes region. The other accident involved 79-year-old James Seeds, of Newport, who fell from his ATV while riding in a gravel pit near Deer Run Sporting Camps in Molunkus shortly before noon Saturday. Loring said Seeds suffered minor injuries and was released after being treated at PVH.

“This is getting to be the busy season for ATVs,” Loring said. “In springtime they start coming out and with all the rain we’ve had in the last month, people are trying to take advantage of what little good weather we’ve had and get out there.”