OTISFIELD – Two youngsters from New Jersey were injured Tuesday morning when the ATV they were riding on veered off Jesse Mill Road and smashed into a tree.

Kyle Nowlin, 13, and his sister Kelsey, 10, who were staying with relatives to attend their grandmother’s funeral on Saturday, were taken by LifeFlight helicopter to Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston where they were each treated for a broken upper leg, according to their uncle, Travis Cummings of Otisfield.

The children, who were wearing helmets, were both conscious at the scene, he said.

Maine law prohibits anyone under the age of 16 from operating an ATV unless they have completed a state-approved safety course or are riding on land where they live or on land owned or leased by a parent or guardian. It was unclear Tuesday if any citations would be issued as a result of the accident.

According to Cummings, who was riding on an ATV in front of the pair with his daughter Myra, 7, the pair went off the road shortly after 11 a.m.

“I don’t know. They drifted off the road and hit a tree,” said Cummings as he drove away from the accident scene after his niece and nephew were on the way to the hospital.

State Trooper Ron Turnick, who is investigating the crash, said it appeared that the driver, Kyle, had only driven an ATV about three times before. His inexperience and perhaps speed, estimated to be about 30 miles per hour at the time of the accident, played a role in the crash, he said.

“There were no skid marks. They hit pretty much head-on,” Turnick said.

The four had been riding down the dirt road from a campsite. Turnick said Cummings heard the crash and turned around, driving about 25 to 30 yards back to the crash scene. He told his niece and nephew, who were thrown about five to seven feet off their vehicle, to stay still while he drove to the nearest house to call for help.

Otisfield fire Chief Mike Hooker said the area, about a mile down Jesse Mill Road from the intersection of Scribner Mill Road, is a popular site for ATV, dirt bike and snowmobile riders. He said the department responds to about three or four accidents a year near the site.

Paramedics from PACE ambulance responded to the scene along with Otisfield Fire Department, Oxford County Sheriff’s Office, Maine State Police and Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife game wardens.

The children were treated initially by PACE workers while a LifeFlight medical team was driven to the scene from their landing site at the intersection of Scribner Mill and Jesse Mill roads by a sheriff’s officer.

Once the children were stabilized, they were brought by ambulances to the helicopter for the flight to CMMC.

The children’s mother was in Lewiston at the time of the accident buying a headstone for her mother’s grave site, Cummings said.