Would a helmet have prevented the severe head injury that left 17-year-old Nicolas Flores in a coma following a snowboarding accident at Sipapú on Sunday afternoon?

That could depend on how fast he was going and what actually happened on the mountain that day.

The National Ski Areas Association recommends helmets for snowboarders and skiers, but warns headgear won't prevent serious head injuries completely. The association, which represents 327 alpine ski resorts around the nation, notes helmets can actually increase risky behavior by snowboarders and skiers, and looks at headgear as secondary to practicing safety on the slopes. "Our concern as an industry is that when you put a helmet on, it gives you a false sense of security," said Dave Byrd, NSAA's director of education and risk. "We've seen that when people put on helmets, they become less risk-averse. Maybe they ski faster than they normally would or take a black diamond course they wouldn't normally try."

NSAA thinks parents and youth have to decide the benefits and drawbacks of wearing helmets.

Snowsport helmets are most effective at preventing head injuries sustained at speeds up to 14 miles per hour, Byrd said. "Most skiers and snowboarders go much faster than that," he said. "Our position is that it is not any particular device that is going to save you. It is skiing responsibly."

Byrd said no state in the U.S. has passed a law requiring helmets for snowboarders or skiers, regardless of age. But that might be coming.

Michigan lawmakers proposed a snowsport helmet law last year following a skiing fatality. The Canadian province of Quebec is talking about a helmet law following the ski accident death earlier this year of actress Natasha Richardson.

This year, Vail Resorts, which operates five ski resorts, will require all of its employees to wear helmets when they are skiing or snowboarding on the job. They'll also require children 12 and under to wear a helmet when taking group lessons, unless a parent signs a waiver.

New Mexico, like many other states, has a law requiring youths 17 and under who ride bicycles, scooters, in-line skates, skateboards and all-terrain vehicles to wear a helmet. A state House of Representatives memorial in 2003 proposed studying the impact of a snowsport helmet law on skiing and snowboarding.

A decade-old study by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission found helmet use would reduce the risk of head injuries among children under age 15 by more than half.

But a study from 2000 to 2005 by Jasper Shealy, a professor at Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, found while the rate of helmet use among snowboarders and skiers has steadily increased, the deaths from injuries have stayed about the same.

A debate over helmet use does nothing right now to help Nicolas Flores, the teen in the coma at Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center. But his father, Billy Flores, still firmly believes if his son had been wearing a helmet, it might have lessened the damage to his son's brain.

He's not blaming the Sipapú ski area. "The ski patrol, everyone there, did a great job of helping Nicolas," Billy Flores said.

Flores, like many parents, urged his son to wear a helmet. But it's hard to make a 17-year-old do something against his or her will.

So a law requiring a helmet for youth 17 and under might add some teeth to a parent's pleadings, he thinks. "They require them for kids on bicycles, why not skiers and snowboarders?" he said. "It shouldn't be that hard."

To read more about recommended safety protocols for the slopes, see www.nsaa.org

To contact the Brain Injury Association of New Mexico, call 888-292-7415.

Contact Staci Matlock at 986-3055 or smatlock@sfnewmexican.com.