Home >  Local News >  Neighborhoods

Monday, June 16, 2003

By Ann Belser, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Two boys were hospitalized last night after their motorized go-cart ran under the front of a sport utility vehicle in Marshall-Shadeland.

Neighbors said the 15-year-old driver of the go-cart had bought the vehicle a few days ago and had been giving his friends rides on it. He and his friends spent most of yesterday fixing up the cart; then last evening he took a 12-year-old boy for a ride.

Normally, police said, the boys who rode the cart had a lookout on the other side of the blind curve on Knapp Street to watch for traffic. But last night there was no one watching.

A 19-year-old man was driving a Ford Explorer down the hill and as the vehicle was about to round the curve the go-cart appeared in its lane, police said.

The sport utility vehicle was nearly stopped or stopped when the collision occurred, police said, but the go-cart did not have brakes that were fully operational.

Police said the go-cart went under the larger vehicle so that the driver had to back up to extricate the boys.

Neighbors said they have been complaining for years about the overgrowth on city property along Knapp Street that makes the curves blind turns.

Both boys were in critical condition last night, on in Allegheny General Hospital, the other to Mercy Hospital.

Police did not release the identities of the boys or of the driver and passenger of the sport utility vehicle, who were not injured.