Posted on 09/06/2007 6:47:06 AM PDT by TornadoAlley3
One family is under investigation and another family has been arrested for leaving a child unattendeed in a hot car.
In the first case, a 22-month-old was left in a car seat for three hours before she died. Ocoee police are still investigating the death.
As for the other family, the parents were lucky, their 3-year-old daughter is doing OK, but her French mother and father are behind bars, charged with child abuse. Many other children do not make it, dying inside these extremely hot cars.
News 13's Karent Castillo turned on a faucet in a kitchen sink. At its hottest temperature, it reached 120 degrees. If you put your hand under the water for more than five minutes, it would become a third-degree burn. This is the same temperature that detectives said the 22-month-old girl felt while inside her mother's car Tuesday.
The Department of children and families investigators are working with police to decide what, if any, charges to recommend to the state attorney.
"When you talk about criminal law you are talking about punishment. You can't punish someone more than losing their child on someone that made an accident so it is going to be somewhat challenging,” said Alan Abramowitz from the Florida Department of Children and Families.
A national database, www.kidsincars.org, is tracking the deaths of children left unattended in cars and 26 kids have died nationally this year.
Because these deaths are on the rise, some companies are coming up with ways to remind parents there child is in the back seat.
The first one is in testing stages with NASA and called the NASA Child Presence Sensor.
There are two parts to the device -- a metal plate under the child's seat and an attachment to your keys. An alarm sounds when the keys and the metal plate are 15 feet away from each other.
The Company Baby Alert already has a device on the market. It comes with a device for the seat buckle and an attachment to your key.
If 20 feet or more separate the buckle and the attachment to the key, the parent is alerted with nursery rhymes on the key ring attachment.
Experts say most of the children left in cars are the younger ones, because car seats are turned around, preventing the parent from being able to see the baby when they leave the car.
The NASA device is not on the market yet, but if you are interested in the device made by Baby Alert. Go to the Baby Alert Web site at https://www.babyalert.info/home.php.
Maybe this would happen less if the parents treated their children like their kids instead of an accessory.
Soooo, it wasn't their fault. Why, no one REMINDED them of thewir child in the car.
Do they need a BABY NEEDS FOOD reminder, too? Where does it end?
It’s a neat idea, but I believe that most of the people who would do such a thing will never buy this device.
Sad comment on our society when a parent has to be reminded their child is in the car.
I agree, I cannot understand how this happens. I think the devices are good if parents want to pay for them. I wonder if it will soon be a govt mandate for all car buyers though.
If the Safety Nazis had not required airbags and forced parents into putting infants in the back seat, parents would not ferget they were in the car. I would be willing to bet that fewer than 26 babies ever died from being in the front seat of a car before airbags were required. When I had my first child I would often put him in the front seat for short trips. I never forgot about him!
How long until they’re Federally mandated?
I am the chairman of my Kiwanis Clubs’ “Kids in Cars” committee. One of the posters reads; Would You Leave A Million Dollars In Your Car?. Well, would you?
Would parents need an alert device to change the diapers, too?
Good Lord, what idiocy.
An outside view of Susita's TO-230
In these fuel-conscious times, when consumers may think twice before cranking the AC, one alternative is a solar car ventilator. Susita makes a model called the TO-230. It's basically a small fan weighing 1-1/2 pounds that goes on top of a car window, with a solar panel facing outward.
The solar panel, which is 5 inches by 4.5 inches, powers the fan, which exchanges hot air inside the car for the presumably cooler air outside. If you park in the shade and want to use the fan, there's a plug-in adapter for the car. One retail Web site says the fan can reduce your parked car's interior temperature by 25 degrees, though that's not much solace considering another Web site cited 160 to 180 degree temps inside a parked car on a sunny day.
Pricing varies online. Digital Kitchen lists the fan for $34.95 in its "Dads & Grads" sale, down from $49.95. Carol Wright gifts carries solar fans for $29.99. AmeriMark listed them for $14.99. Or try your luck bidding on eBay.
http://news.com.com/8301-10784_3-6079960-7.html
Not with my kid in there.
But...but that was before global warming so car interiors stayed cooler back then!
ping
Well, it would be cheaper to buy a brain.
I talked to a tow truck driver who had to respond to a call of a kid locked in a car. He spent about 30 minutes trying to get in because the kid kept pushing the locking mechanism back down.....
“Side note - With three kids, none of mine were ever forgotten in the car. Once two got locked in at that was pure excitement for about five minutes.”
There was a recent story of a 4 YO who died after she went outside and locked herself in a car and couldn’t get out. You were lucky.
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