Posted on 11/16/2016 1:14:27 PM PST by nickcarraway
A 5-year-old boy with Down syndrome suffered painful burns after getting trapped in a clothes dryer that started automatically, the Irish Times reported.
Riley Gedge-Duffy climbed into the dryer Sunday at the family’s home in Northern Ireland.
Riley’s father, Aaron Duffy, said things could have been much worse — if it wasn’t for the family dog.
Riley’s mother was vacuuming upstairs, the Times reported, and might not have heard the racket until it was too late.
But Riley’s father said their cockapoo, Teddy, “ran upstairs and basically went berserk so she knew something was not right.”
The dog reportedly ran back and forth to the dryer. When Riley’s mother followed him, she heard “banging and crashing and could see his iPad going round and round.”
She pulled Riley out the of dryer, poured cold water on him and took him to the hospital, where he was treated for burns and bruising to his head, according to the Times.
“It doesn’t bear thinking about what might have happened if the dog had not been there,” the Times quoted Riley’s father as saying.
I didn’t know clothes dryers can start automatically?
My first thought was to criticize the family for having such a dryer that was probably front loaded and automatically starting. Then I thought, these parents most likely did not expect to have a Downs child, and like most, were not fully prepared. You learn as time goes on. Secondly, even with a disabled child, you cannot watch them 24/7. That’s not really a normal way of living, and it will teach the child to leave all decision making to other people.
Disability happens in varying degrees. Most kids will learn something after getting into a troublesome moment. Thank goodness for the dog. The mom was very smart to tell the whole story before the hospital or any school made the presumption that the burns were caused by parental abuse.
Yeah, that’s not a design feature...
I can’t find it in myself to be too harsh on them. Kids of all kinds do this kind of thing. I know I did (I remember getting in the dryer trying to make it go around...good think it never did)
Unless it had time left on the cycle and mom went up stairs and the boy got in and shut door? would it maybe restart then?
For him to be burned it would have to be pretty hot some how and if it was cold to start with, he’d have to have been in a while for it to heat up???
(I don’t really like thinking of how it all happened. Glad he is ok. Hope it doesn’t happen again or to others)
Maybe the dog started it.
Bum Bum Bum Be Dummmm.. We are Farmers,weve seen it all.
That was great thanks
Mothers, watch your children more carefully. When I was a young man of 19, I rented a basement room from a divorced mom who had four little children. Had. Somehow, one toddler got into the clothes dryer and suffocated. Whether the other three kids put the toddler in, is unknown. I rented the room soon after this happened, but knew of the situation from hanging out with a friend that lived across the street. She was very depressed for the year I lived there, thinking of what happened to that child. In later years, I watched my own children and then grandchildren like a hawk over its offspring.
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