3 boys seriously injured after ATV collision on northern Manitoba First Nation

Three young boys were flown from a northeastern Manitoba First Nation to Winnipeg with serious injuries last week after the ATV they were riding was hit by a vehicle.

Around 8:30 p.m Friday, two community members alerted Shamattawa RCMP to a serious collision between a vehicle and an ATV that had left several young people badly injured on Main Street and Hudson Bay Avenue in the community, police said in a Monday news release.

Investigators learned that a vehicle with two adults and two children had collided with an ATV, which police say was driven by a 13-year-old and was carrying two other boys, ages 11 and 13.

The three boys on the ATV were seriously injured in the collision. RCMP officers, who were the only first responders at the scene, provided the boys there with what RCMP said was "life-saving" medical treatment, and bystanders helped police take the boys to the local nursing station.

They were then flown to Winnipeg for further treatment, RCMP said.

The 25-year-old man driving the other vehicle and a passenger, a 21-year-old woman, were not injured in the collision. Two boys in that vehicle, ages nine and 10, suffered minor injuries and were also taken to the nursing station.

Supt. Paul Peddle, the officer in charge of Manitoba RCMP's North District, said in the news release that the collision was a "very traumatic and difficult scene" for everyone involved.

Shamattawa First Nation is about 350 kilometres southeast of Churchill and 750 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg.