SALINAS - A 9-year-old boy was flown to a bay area hospital after being hit on his bicycle while not wearing a helmet.
It happened on Tuesday afternoon near Bradbury and Fitzgerald streets.
After looking into the incident, Salinas Police said the child failed to yield where he was supposed to and a car hit him.
This is the second time children have been severely hurt in a biking accident in just the last couple of weeks.
"He was crying so bad," said Brian Le, one of the witnesses. "It look like blood was coming out on his face. It seemed to me he had a broken arm or shoulder, or something like that."
Le said he saw the boy moments after he ran his bike into a moving car
Police said he wasn't wearing a helmet and he didn't yield to a car in the intersection.
Le said he's surprised more kids aren't hurt, because the neighborhood is full of kids on bikes not paying attention.
"A lot of bikers ride their bike around here every day and I don't see they have any helmets on their heads," he said. "They cross the street without looking at traffic."
Two weeks ago two young children were run over by a car when the father they were riding bikes with rode out into the intersection on North Main Street without looking.
Jan Valencia is a member of Velo Monterey Club and helps promote bike safety.
An avid biker himself, he said bike safety is a two-way street and showed Central Coast News some rules of the road.
"Signaling your turns, signaling your stops. Using the proper turn lanes. Not riding on the sidewalks of course," he said.
And, with that, everyone could be safer on the road.
According to the DMV each year in California, more than 100 people are killed in bike crashes, and hundreds of thousands more are hurt.
For information on how to bike safely, visit Bicycling Monterey's Web site at www.BikeMonterey.org, or Velo Club Monterey at www.VCMonterey.org.
