Child died of heatstroke in a Car How does this Happen?

hollydolly

hollydolly

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Location
London England
How does a parent forget they have a child in the car?..Another child has died because a parent left her in a boiling hot car...how could this even happen? Poor little mite, what a way to die... :(

The identity of a one-year-old girl who died after being left in a car all day in blistering 89 degree heat has been revealed.

Katera Barker died on Wednesday in Nashville, Tennessee, after adoptive dad Matt Barker left her in a car and took a ride sharing service to the airport for a business trip, the Tennessean reported.
Police say that Matt Barker dropped off Katera and her five-year-old sibling at daycare on Wednesday morning, but didn't realize that Katera was still in the car after the drop-off.


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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...died-adoptive-father-forgot-car-89F-heat.html
 

This happens more often than we would like to think. Every summer, there are several articles about children dying (or barely being rescued) in this way. I have no explanation for it either; it boggles the mind.
 

Tragic news.

Is it my imagination or is this a recent phenomenon, I don't remember hearing about such things 40 or 50 years ago.

Maybe it's just due to the reach of the internet that they seem so horribly common these days.
 
I don't think it did happen years ago Aunt Bea...something like that would have spread around the town like wildfire by word of mouth, and certainly here in the Uk it would have been headline news.. No-one would have ever forgotten parents who let their child suffocate to death in heated car...and yes we hear more and more of these types of deaths these days, I just don't understand how anyone specifically this case who had a couple of children in the car, remembered to drop one off and 'forgot' to take out his second child , it just beggars belief that there's apparently no action being taken against the father.
 
Aunt Bea said:
Tragic news.

Is it my imagination or is this a recent phenomenon, I don't remember hearing about such things 40 or 50 years ago.

Maybe it's just due to the reach of the internet that they seem so horribly common these days.
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Yeah, back in the day, leaving a child in the car was more a perk, than felony

Gramma would leave me in the car for hours while she shopped at ‘monkey wards’
And that ol’ black 50 chevy got hot
Last words from Gramma ‘don’t you dare roll that winda down’

So, I’m sittin’ in the back seat, melting, sweat pouring from my baseball cap into my eyes, ready to pass out when it dawned on me….Gramma is inside…I have the car to myself
I jump into the front
Roll the driver’s side window down, roll up my sleeve, hang my arm out the window
Other arm on the steering wheel
Waitin’ for my bitch
There’s a few alterations as time passes
A straightened cig from the ashtray, hangin’ from the corner of my mouth, and an anchor tattoo on what would later become a bicep
Nobody seemed to notice I was on my knees

I actually hated to see Gramma come

But that was then

This is now
 
I cannot imagine in my wildest dreams doing something like this, either. I mean, it's not like forgetting a bag of groceries in the car. I just can't understand forgetting a child in the car! Don't people look in their back seat any more? Don't they pay any attention at all to what they are doing with their children? How can a person be unaware there is still a child in the car?
 
I can't even begin to imagine the pain a parent would suffer, for the rest of their lives, knowing that they had accidentally killed one of their children for any reason.

Not completely off topic.....let's also not forget about the dangers of leaving pets in closed vehicles during the summer.

01cd3fc6985b390ea811e11ed92ef985.jpg hot-car-safety.jpg
 
Many attribute this relatively recent problem to back seat (and backward facing) car seats. Parents in a hurry try to do four things at once so they can get to work on time.

It might not be a bad idea to have electronic check-lists in parents' cars - similar to what pilots and surgeons use.

Baby in seat? Check
Baby strapped in? Check
Baby removed from seat? Check

And so forth.
 
It is so sad to see this. My husband has a 2017 Chevy Bolt. There is a dashboard alert that will sound an warning to "check the back seat" if he has anything at all of any weight on the back seat. It is scary that we need to have our car remind us to look in the back seat.
But I can also see a driver becoming deaf to the warning after a while.
 
About 30 years ago, there was a story in the newspaper about a lady who pulled out of a shopping center here in Orlando. A passing officer noticed that there was a car seat on the top of the car with a baby in it.

He didn't want to scare her into slamming on her brakes so he got her to pull over slowly. He jumped out and she asked, "What did I do, Officer?" He asked, "Where is your baby?" She screamed and jumped out of the car. She had taken out the seat to use in the shopping cart and then sat the seat, with baby, on top of the car to load the bags. Just forgot about the baby on the top of the car, I guess.

There are times we have all gone brain dead from the rigors of parenthood. I know I have, but luckily I've never forgotten my baby.
 
As per the local news...the answer to all this is to place something IMPORTANT !! like a purse in the back seat with the infant ?!?! EXCUSE ME !!...a purse is more important than one's child ??

I'm afraid our society is headed down hill...
 
RadishRose said:
I cannot stand this.
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Me either. We don’t have children so I’m not technically a human mom but we’ve always had dogs and if we have to bring our dogs with us on a hot day, we bring two sets of car keys ; one to leave the air conditioner on and one for us. We also go out to check on them.

In winter they have dog coats, beds and blankets. We are far from perfect but I couldn’t imagine forgetting them.
I suppose sad stuff happens all the time. I’d hate to be the parents that forgot.
 
Butterfly said:
Multi-tasking or no, when getting to the plane on time is more important than the life of your child, something is very wrong. I just do not see any excuse for this kind of "mistake."
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I absolutely agree... especially when there were 2 children in the car in this instance . How can someone remember to drop one off and not the other?...it just beggars belief !!
 
hollydolly said:
I absolutely agree... especially when there were 2 children in the car in this instance . How can someone remember to drop one off and not the other?...it just beggars belief !!
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Local woman 3 or so years ago....went to school [she was an administrator] left her baby in the back of her vehicle along with a tray of doughnuts . Came back out & got the doughnuts...and still left the baby in the car. The baby died....
 
rgp said:
Local woman 3 or so years ago....went to school [she was an administrator] left her baby in the back of her vehicle along with a tray of doughnuts . Came back out & got the doughnuts...and still left the baby in the car. The baby died....
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That's what the man did who was convicted of murdering his toddler son on purpose.
Hours later he returned to his car to get something, then left again.

The DA speculated that he might have gone back to check to see if his son was dead.

.
 
rgp said:
As per the local news...the answer to all this is to place something IMPORTANT !! like a purse in the back seat with the infant ?!?! EXCUSE ME !!...a purse is more important than one's child ??

I'm afraid our society is headed down hill...
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RGP, you're either unimaginably obtuse or a real ba!!buster, even when a terrible tragedy is being discussed.

With my apologies to people reading this who fall into neither category, I'll take RGP through your local news' intention.

The quite excellent suggestion to put one's purse (briefcase, lunch, whatever) in the back seat is a secondary way to remind distracted parents that their children may still be in their car seats. We all occasionally forget a purse, lunch, briefcase, cellphone etc. in our cars, but generally feel the reminder as soon as we walk into the store or work, because we have the habit of using or putting those things away when we arrive at our destination. That's what your news program meant by important. They could have said, "an item of habitual use" instead, but that would have been awkward (and overkill for most of their viewers).

Most kids ride in car seats about 3 times per day. 3 X 365 days X 6 years = 6570. Given that a parent only needs to be absent-minded one time for tragedy to occur, secondary reminders are invaluable.
 
StarSong said:
RGP, you're either unimaginably obtuse or a real ba!!buster, even when a terrible tragedy is being discussed.

With my apologies to people reading this who fall into neither category, I'll take RGP through your local news' intention.

The quite excellent suggestion to put one's purse (briefcase, lunch, whatever) in the back seat is a secondary way to remind distracted parents that their children may still be in their car seats. We all occasionally forget a purse, lunch, briefcase, cellphone etc. in our cars, but generally feel the reminder as soon as we walk into the store or work, because we have the habit of using or putting those things away when we arrive at our destination. That's what your news program meant by important. They could have said, "an item of habitual use" instead, but that would have been awkward (and overkill for most of their viewers).

Most kids ride in car seats about 3 times per day. 3 X 365 days X 6 years = 6570. Given that a parent only needs to be absent-minded one time for tragedy to occur, secondary reminders are invaluable.
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Starsong.......you are apparently , horribly ignorant,... if you feel any "reminder" could be stronger than the child to which one gives birth too.
 
rgp said:
Starsong.......you are apparently , horribly ignorant,... if you feel any "reminder" could be stronger than the child to which one gives birth too.
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I gave birth to three children and am here to tell you that distractions happen. Humans are imperfect beings who sometimes forget or overlook that which matters most to us.
 
rgp said:
per the local news...the answer to all this is to place something IMPORTANT !! like a purse in the back seat with the infant ?!?! EXCUSE ME !!...a purse is more important than one's child ??

I'm afraid our society is headed down hill...
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Whatever works.

In the case of the father, his billfold or brief case.

As you previously posted, one woman came back to her car for donuts and still forgot her dying child. Maybe if she had left the donuts in the back seat near her child... maybe not.

.
 

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