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Crash injures girl despite child seat

A 5-year-old hurt in a Belcher Road accident was in a safety seat, but authorities suspect she wasn't strapped in properly.

CLEARWATER - As traffic crashes go, the collision of the black Nissan pickup and the gold Ford wagon on Monday morning appeared rather routine.

No one seemed to be speeding. The damage to the autos was fairly minor. Everyone was strapped in. Normally, police would take a report, quickly get the cars towed away and reopen the road in an hour or so.

Instead, police were threading yellow tape around the road, calling in the department's traffic-death investigators, summoning an emergency helicopter and hoping that a little girl would see another morning.

"We're all praying that she's going to be okay," said Lt. Steve Burch, commander of the department's traffic section.

The girl, 5-year-old Katelin McDonald, was a back-seat passenger in the gold wagon. Her mother, Jerri Ann McDonald, 40, of Largo, had strapped her into a child seat, a move that police say more parents should practice.

But police said they suspect Mrs. McDonald didn't use the child seat correctly. Burch said the girl's injuries are more severe than what a properly strapped child would sustain in that type of crash.

"It's very serious, possibly life-threatening," Burch said. "You're not going to get that type of injury in this type of crash without installation failure."

If that is the case, Mrs. McDonald is part of an overwhelming majority. Studies have shown more than 90 percent of parents do not use child seats properly, meaning they are unknowingly placing their children at risk, said Officer Greg Bickel, a child safety seat technician for the Clearwater Police Department.

Katelin was flown by helicopter to Bayfront Medical Center, St. Petersburg, then transferred to All Children's Hospital. Her mother also was taken to Bayfront with less serious injuries, police said.

Burch praised Mrs. McDonald for placing her daughter in a seat at all. Under state law, only children 4 years old and under are required to be in a child seat. But police recommend keeping children in safety or booster seats until age 8 or older.

"The parent went above and beyond," Burch said.

But he said parents should take one more step and receive training on how to properly use the seats.

"Just buying the seat at the store and slapping it in the back of a car does not mean it's a safe ride," Burch said. "I'm not faulting the parent. Good intentions were not enough. This crash points out the importance of having child safety seats checked."

Child-safety seat inspections and training are available at virtually every police or fire department. In Clearwater, Bickel sets up appointments with parents on Thursdays. He said it takes about 45 minutes for him to train a parent in all the ins and outs of child seat safety.

The classes Bickel needed to become a trainer lasted four days, a good indiction of how complex child seat installation can be. How a child should be seated can vary based on age, the child's size and the type of seat.

Federal transportation officials say traffic deaths are the No. 1 killer of children. In the 1990s, about 90,000 youngsters under the age of 20 died in traffic crashes. Of those, 16,500 were under the age of 10, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.

More than 40 percent of the children under 8 who are killed in crashes were not restrained. The chance of a child being killed or seriously injured in a crash is clipped by 70 percent if the youngster is properly strapped in, according to the NTSB.

Bickel said parents commonly don't receive proper training, and some don't read the owner's manual. Common mistakes include strapping the child in too loosely or too low. Both errors can lead to serious injury or death.

The crash Monday occurred just after 7 a.m. as Mrs. McDonald drove north on Belcher Road. The pickup was traveling south on Belcher and had stopped to make a left turn into the Gulf Bay Animal Hospital parking lot.

Burch said a semitrailer truck had stopped in the left lane of northbound Belcher Road, preparing to turn left into the U.S. Postal Service building. He said the driver of the pickup, Melanie Ann Pixon, 26, of Clearwater, couldn't see very well around the truck.

She turned left and into the path of the Ford wagon. The right front side of each vehicle collided.

No charges were filed in connection with the crash Monday, but the investigation remained open, police said.

Pixon also had a child in her auto, 6-year-old Jacob Patrick Behring. Both went to Bayfront Medical Center with minor injuries, police said.

- Chris Tisch can be reached at 445-4156 or tisch@sptimes.com

Anyone interested in taking child seat safety classes can call Clearwater police Officer Greg Bickel at 562-4171 or virtually any local police or fire department. For more information on child safety seats, including a list of departments that offer training on proper usage, visit the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Web site at www.nhtsa.dot.gov