Kids are fast. You cant always control them.
Having said that, they should have been extra cautious if they knew they were heading to a risky place.
A woman in my office has a 7 year old boy with this exact issue. At a river cook out he ran straight for the fired up charcoal grill. His mom anticipated this and no harm. Later he ran straight for the pier and she caught that too. Exhausting. Especially since her husband left her. It’s a constant struggle.
They have “leashes” for severely autistic kids in NYC. This is why. Seems barbaric, but it keeps them from running into traffic.
Kids do stupid things. You can - with effort - worldproof your child, but you can’t - despite liberals’/progressives’ worst efforts - childproof the world.
I once watched in horror as my 8 year old son rode his bike down a sidewalk without stopping or slowing down at the street just about 50 yards from our house right into the path of an oncoming car whose driver MUST have seen him and braked HARD - God Bless those BMW engineers.
I ran over, thanked the driver profusely while he yelled about watching my kid and I proceeded to CHAIN my son’s bicycle up for a week. My wife never forgave me for punishing him for this. I know her. She never would have forgiven me had he died.
My prayers for peace, understanding and comfort go out to the grieving parents.
Both can be true at the same time. But people should not be using a tragedy like this as an opportunity to tell the parents what they did wrong as parents. Just because you can comment doesn’t mean you should.
Your question reminds me of how some kids were restrained when I was young. In the 50’s my mom used to take me shopping with her and I vividly recall some kids with a harness on similar to what a dog would have along with a leash.
By today’s standards this is unbelievable, laughable and considered child abuse.
But regarding the thread story, children can be very impulsive without autism. Tragedies happen and are not always someone’s fault.
But for those that blame the parents, should this child have been harnessed and leashed like a dog? Should the parents have had a firm grip on her the whole time? Should the girl have been locked away somewhere so she could forever be safe? Or should she have been drugged into a mindless blob and just shuffle along with mom and dad?
Kids, Dogs....anyone or anything that will run away in a dangerous area - including traffic, needs to be protected.
It happens more often than one might imagine.
Years back, my wife and I, along with our 5-year old daughter and 4-year old son, checked into a downtown Marriott in Atlanta; an umteenth floor high-rise monolith. After check-in, we walked to the elevators (there were 4 or 6 of em in the center of the building, can’t remember) to go to our room. Both of our hands were full with luggage & kids.
When we got to the elevators, the 4-year old broke loose from his mother’s grip, immediately ran into an open elevator and before we could reach him: the door closed and “WHISK”, off it went like a rocket with him in it!!!! Needless to say, sheer panic!!
It took Mariott security over an hour to find him. Finally, they found him somewhere near the top floor, sitting in a corner of a hallway, crying his eyes out for his mom.
They got him back down to the front desk, but they didn’t want to turn him over to us until he identifed us as his parents...that didn’t take long because he literally lunged for his mom’s arms...
It happens. They’re quick and unpredictable at times.
I wasn’t there. Neither were all the people criticizing the parents.
Thats what harnesses are for…
Sad story.
What country is that?
Took awhile in the narrative to get to that point.
“Grieving family attacked after excited daughter, 11, ran ahead at beauty spot and tumbled off 20-story cliff”
Must be the translation, but cliffs don’t have stories. They are measured in feet/meters not stories.
Reminds me of parents I’ve seen at the Grand Canyon. Children there NEED leashes! Unruly children running around just a few feet from certain DEATH!
NO, not MILES of fences, just common sense of parents.
I wouldn’t go out of my way to scourge the grieving parents, but since you solicited opinions:
The parents blew it when they chose to take their autistic, excitable child, to visit an unbarricaded 20-story cliff. Binding an 11 year-old hand and foot does not make for a happy holiday; and, no amount of “watching” will stop such a child from darting off, after which it can be too late. The parents should have taken their child to relatively safe places, with much larger margins for error.
Cynics and the police might ponder whether the parents desired, consciously or unconsciously, to get rid of a burdensome child. I’d chalk it up to a lack of foresight and common sense. I bet the police have interviewed people who knew the family, combed their social media, and otherwise looked for indications.
I was at the dentist’s office when a small child bolted and was half way out the door.
His mother shouted their code word and he immediately froze.
My wife tends to freeze in some situations. We have a code word which causes her to focus only on me for instructions.