Accident Victim Now Advocate for Helmets

If you go bicycle riding without your helmet, don’t tell 11-year-old Peter Beal or you’re likely to get a tongue-lashing.

The Granada Hills boy has been an ardent supporter of helmets since he was hit by a car while riding a bike near his home last August. Peter was seriously injured, suffering several bone fractures. Doctors told him he would have died if he had not been wearing his bicycle helmet.

Peter will join 20 children in a trip to Washington, D.C., in May as a SAFE KIDS All Star. The children, chosen by hospitals nationwide, have either saved other youngsters from injury or have become safety advocates since their own accidents.

The entire Beal family have become boosters of bicycle helmets since the crash and think nothing of stopping to tell kids to be safe. “You can’t not say something,” Denice Beal, Peter’s mother, said. “Especially the little kids, it makes my skin crawl” when they don’t wear helmets.

Peter and his brother, Jonathan, 13, were riding home on Zelzah Avenue when Peter was hit by a car between Tulsa and Tribune streets. Battered and bleeding, Peter said he remembered little about the crash except giving the helicopter pilot a thumbs up as he was carried onto an air ambulance en route to Childrens Hospital of Los Angeles. Peter said he still has pain and some numbness in spots. He suffered a severe fracture of a femur and the family is worried that it may stunt the bone’s growth.

In Washington, Peter will participate in the SAFE KIDS GEAR UP games, receive training on public policy and meet with members of Congress. He said he already knows what to say. “I’d like them to pass a bill: no helmet, no bike,” he said. “There are too many kids who don’t wear a helmet and don’t know the consequences of not wearing one.”

The Beal family attributes Peter’s life to his bike helmet and a lot of prayer.

“We look at life a little bit differently,” his mother said.