Our guilt was tremendous and irrational . All around us children were suffering , but from illness , from uncontrollable sources ; whereas , every time our son called out in pain we felt that we had done this to him and that we had caused the horror he was living in .

I don ' t have the vocabulary to describe the weight of fear we lived with those days . We stood helpless while our son begged us for help , begged us to let him die . We watched his blood running out of a tube from his stomach and a tube from his lung . Tubes in his chest and arms were replenishing vital fluids he was rapidly losing internally . His eyes were dark and blank , seeming to be in a place we couldn ' t share . A last - minute decision was made to do surgery , although we

carefully warned it probably wouldn ' t help much . After sur gery there were 11 days of pain and morphine in a pediatric inten sive care where Bob was told he had set a record of having 12 tubes in his body . Repeatedly we heard : “ Do you realize how lucky you are ? ” The surgeon said : “ I never dreamed I could do a

dreamed I could do a definitive surgery . ” There was hope again , and they called Bob the “ miracle child . ” We have no guarantees because pancreatitis is a tricky thing , but we are thankful for every day we have our son .

When we got home we immediately called or wrote to every friend we have with a son telling them what had happened and warning them about ATC ' s . Everyone who knew Bob and knew that he had always been an intelligent , cautious child recognized the truth when we said that no child , however skilled , is equipped to handle a machine that is so unstable and yet so powerful and heavy . We saw the doubt in people who didn ' t know Bob well . The natural doubt that if a young boy is hurt on something with a motor that he was surely doing something wrong .

In Gatlinburg , TN , three - wheel cycles don ' t sell very well , and we have had many parents tell us that Bob ' s experience changed their minds about purchasing an ATC .

It is sad that our son was forced to know the fine line between life and death and to know suffering at an age when he wasn ' t mentally or emotionally ready for this knowledge . When he came home and was fussed over and rejoiced over , instead of feeling he had been given a great gift , he felt like a freak , different from his peers . He wasn ' t disobeying or doing something wrong ; yet , some thing horrible happened to him , and he can find no joy in the expe rience . He never talks about the accident and when any tions it he becomes tense and angry .

Now that awareness of the danger of ATC ' s is growing through the statistics , the media and committees such as this one , we have the heartfelt hope that something , such as banning ATC ' s com pletely or at least banning the sale of them for children , will be done .

We are glad to be here to express our deep feelings on the seri ousness of this situation and our strong desire to prevent other children and parents from going through what we and too many others have had to experience . Mr . BARNARD . Thank you very much , Mrs . Vance .

We will now hear from Sandra Crisp . Mrs . Crisp is from Fort Washington , MD .