Salisbury Fire Department

The temperature in your car can increase 20 degrees in just 10 minutes.  Over the past 20 years, approximately 800 children have died due to heatstroke after being left unattended in vehicles.  The National Highway Trafic Safety Administration (NHTSA) wants every parent to be aware of these facts because they say it has nothing to do with parenting skills, most of the time it is a preventable accident.  The organization offers tips to prevent heatstroke from happening to your child.

Ways of prevention: 

• NEVER leave a child alone in a parked car even with the windows rolled down or the air conditioning on.
• ALWAYS check both the front and back of the vehicle before locking your doors.
• NEVER let children play in an unattended vehicle.
• ALWAYS lock your vehicle doors.
• ALWAYS keep keys out of your children reach.
• MAYBE place a briefcase, purse, or cell phone next to the child’s car seat so that you’ll always check the back seat before leaving the car.

Ways to remind yourself the child is in the car: 

• Use that cell phone to call your spouse or another caregiver to confirm you`ve dropped your child off.
• Write a note and place it on the dashboard of your car.
• Set a reminder on your cell phone or calendar to remind you to double check.

The current stats of 2019, according to Traffic Safety Marketing:

• Child heatstroke fatalities this year: 9
• Child heatstroke fatalities in 2018: 52
• Child heatstroke fatalities in 2017: 43
• National average of child heatstroke fatalities per year since 1998: 38
• Total number of child heatstroke fatalities from 1998 – present: 803