The teenager was sledding with a 3-year-old boy in Lewiston “when they hit a tree at the bottom of the hill,” the office said in a press release.
The two children were then taken to John R. Oishei Children’s Hospital in Buffalo, where, according to the office, the girl was pronounced dead.
The park where they were sledding, Clyde L. Burmaster Park, has been closed and the case is still under investigation, the sheriff’s office said.
According to the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, between 2008 and 2017, 220,488 patients were treated in US emergency rooms for injuries related to sledding. Almost 70% of these patients were children 19 years of age and under.