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4 Recent Hot Car Deaths Prompts Urgent Plea for New Safety Technology
On the heels of National Child Vehicular Heatstroke Prevention & Awareness Day on Sunday, July 31, KidsAndCars.org is urgently calling upon the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to require driver reminder technology in all vehicles to help to prevent the tragic deaths of babies and toddlers dying in hot cars. So far this year, at least 23 children have died of heatstroke in vehicles, nearly as many as the total for last year, KidsAndCars.org reports. Four died over the July 22-24 weekend in the states of Florida, Pennsylvania, Missouri and Texas. "Since 1990 more than 775 children have died in these preventable tragedies. Where is the outrage?" stated Janette Fennell, president and founder of KidsAndCars.org, the only national nonprofit child safety organization dedicated solely to preventing injuries and deaths of children in and around vehicles. "Automakers have already added numerous reminders to make sure we buckle up, don't leave keys in the ignition, don't leave our headlights on and many more. We think a driver reminder chime to save a child's life should be just as important as preventing a dead car battery."
A Mother’s Plea After Baby Dies In Hot Car
Texas leads the nation in heatstroke-related deaths of children in cars by a large margin with 106 fatalities from 1991 to 2015. Janette Fennell is founder and president of KidsAndCars.org, a national child safety nonprofit based in Philadelphia. She says those numbers began drastically rising in the 1990s when laws were passed requiring young children be placed in the back seat to avoid injuries from airbags. “Out of sight, out of mind,” says Fennell. “We further are keeping our kids safer by having them rear-facing. And if you’re the driver of a vehicle, you can’t tell if there’s a baby in that car seat or not — because they’re in their little cacoon, they fall asleep, you’re probably sleep-deprived and it’s a real recipe for disaster.”
How We Can Protect Children From Dying in Hot Cars
Right now, somewhere in the United States, a family is going about their daily lives unaware that by year’s end their child will die in a hot car. They will suffer the same loss that has already consumed 23 families in guilt and grief this year. That includes four this past weekend in Florida, Pennsylvania, Missouri and Texas. On average, 37 children die this way annually in the United States—meaning that at this pace, another 14 more American families will experience this tragedy this year.
What persuaded DA not to charge Rome cop whose baby died after he left the boy in car
This is the home in the town of Western near Rome where a baby, Michael Fanfarillo, died after his father left him in the back seat of the car for eight hours after he forgot to drop him off at child care on June 6, 2016. (Patrick Lohmann | plohmann@syracuse.com) Michael Fanfarillo, 4 1/2 months old, died after his father left him in a car at the family home on June 6, 2016. Michael Fanfarillo, 4 1/2 months old, died after his father left him in a car at the family home on June 6, 2016.
Autopilot
Have you ever forgotten your phone? When did you realise you’d forgotten it? I’m guessing you didn’t just smack your forehead and exclaim ‘damn’ apropos of nothing. The realisation probably didn’t dawn on you spontaneously. More likely, you reached for your phone, pawing open your pocket or handbag, and were momentarily confused by it not being there. Then you did a mental restep of the morning’s events. Shit. In my case, my phone’s alarm woke me up as normal but I realised the battery was lower than I expected. It was a new phone and it had this annoying habit of leaving applications running that drain the battery overnight. So, I put it on to charge while I showered instead of into my bag like normal. It was a momentary slip from the routine but that was all it took. Once in the shower, my brain got back into ‘the routine’ it follows every morning and that was it. Forgotten.
