PORTSMOUTH, N.H. (AP) – The tragic death a youngster who fell underneath the wheels of a flatbed trailer during a parade is triggering new proposals to legislate better safety.

Newly elected Rep. Paul McEachern, D-Portsmouth, said he will submit a bill banning all flatbed trailers with outrigger wheels, which extend out from the body of the trailer.

“People don’t see the danger (of these vehicles) because they are moving so slowly,” McEachern told the Portsmouth Herald, “but the parade could speed up and catch someone unaware.”

Fellow Portsmouth Democrat, Rep. Jim Splaine, has agreed to co-sponsor the legislation.

Splaine said he believes the bill also would add a requirement for railings on floats.

“This will be an opportunity to address a number of parade safety-related issues,” Splaine said.

Witnesses said 9-year-old Thomas Fogarty of Greenland was sitting with his legs dangling over the side of his Cub Scout troop’s float when it hit a bump and he fell in the path of the wheels during last weekend’s holiday parade. Others said he was walking beside the float when he fell. He was run over and later died of his injuries at Portsmouth Regional Hospital.

McEachern said the boy wasn’t the only one injured that day.

He said an older gentleman was run over by the front outrigger wheels of the float he was walking next to. McEachern said it was only through the quick action of another person that the man avoided serious injury.

The man was treated at the hospital the following day for major contusions to his feet, the lawmaker said.

“Requiring a railing on these floats would not help someone like that who was just walking alongside the float,” McEachern said.

A bill rejected by the state Legislature four years ago would have required a safety railing on parade floats. Although McEachern said he understood that the cause of Fogarty’s death is still under investigation, he noted that the trailer the boy was reportedly riding on had outrigger wheels.

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Information from: Portsmouth Herald, http://www.seacoastonline.com

AP-ES-12-09-06 1018EST