Another baby has died in a hot car (Spain)

[comoatoupeira]

Another child has died in a horrific way after being accidentally left in a hot car.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/21/girl-dies-car-extreme-heat-spain

again, it was the father, distracted by work, who forgot to drop her off at nursery. I honesty don’t think this is a man/woman thing I think it is a work thing. In every one of this abominable stories it is someone being distracted by a work situation and they forget they haven’t dropped off the child. The article explains really well why it happens and how we need to make safeguards because we can’t rely on ourselves at all times.

distraction kills! Much more than malevolent intent.

AIBU to think that every single parent needs to read this article to realise it can happen to anyone and sometimes extreme stress and the power of habit can overcome us and cause the worst to happen
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/fatal-distraction-forgetting-a-child-in-thebackseat-of-a-car-is-a-horrifying-mistake-is-it-a-crime/2014/06/16/8ae0fe3a-f580-11e3-a3a5-42be35962a52_story.html

BE WARNED it is the most upsetting piece of writing I have ever read.

Shocking if you think that’s what it is. You can be the best most loving parent in the world and still forget your kid. Literally happens all the time.

They keep making the mistake of believing it is an active choice these poor parents are making.

I think thats it exactly 99.9999% of the time its no harm done, nobody really hears about it.

We've had mums fess up they've left a baby in the hall, and in the post office.
I know mums of the older generation who habitually left the prams outside small shops, who've fessed up they forgot the baby and darted back to get them.

There must be baby's found ill, dehydrated etc but make a full recovery we don't hear about either.

Its the odd one or two globally that end in disaster that make the international news. Its such a rare thing to end in disaster with.

Well you are right it obviously does happen otherwise there wouldn't be these recurring tragedies.

But I don't think the fact I don't understand how a person can forget their child's very existence in the back of their car is shocking.

It just beggars belief to me that people on this thread need reminders that their child is in the car with them. How unimportant is a child in people's lives that they forget their presence? That is what I find shocking.

That’s ridiculous and an unkind thing to say, like you’re a better parents and a lot of parents make their children second place.

No I’ve never forgotten my child, not felt close to.

I do not believe that I would ever have forgotten my child, but I’m not those parents and don’t know what happened that day these things happened, but my god I’ve got sympathy for all involved.

Im not a better person, I’m a parent that did their best.

They aren't forgetting the child exists, or their existence, they are forgetting the act of dropping off.
They have it in their head its business as usual.

Once again, it has absolutely nothing to do with “how important the child is in their lives”. It’s about being distracted. It’s about being on autopilot or a change in routine.

There are lots of tragic cases where children suffer because of their parents neglect: neglect to provide for their children's basic needs for food, clothing, hygiene, emotional support etc etc. And the children suffer. And generally society is upset by this lack of care for children who are dependent on adults for their care
Forgetting the existence of your child, even though that child is in your car, is actually just another form of neglect. Which can and does lead to the child suffering. To me you excusing this because the parent is " distracted" is double standards.

To forget to drop the child off surely means you have forgotten the child is there? Otherwise when you got to work or whatever your destination is you would realise you had forgotten to to drop them off!

'No I’ve never forgotten my child, not felt close to. I do not believe that I would ever have forgotten my child'

There you go then. Finally admitting what some of us have said throughout. They aren't carkeys or glasses that we do often forget and no it absolutely cannot happen to anyone.

Im not saying I'm a better parent.

I'm saying I don't forget the existence of my children and I don't understand how any parent can.

Neither do I, but I wasn’t that parent that day!

It's a public forum, posters can post as this wish within TGs. It's really not nice to talk to people like this. Try to stick to the topic.

It is staggering. All parents are sleep deprived, all are distracted. It is another level of disconnect though to be this removed from the situation.

I forgot my car once. I walk almost everywhere, and have done for twenty years. Had car errands to do, parked in big multi storey car park, probably do that once or twice a year.

And I walked home with my shopping as I do pretty much every single day of my life. It took me until 8pm to realise the car wasn't at home.

DM left DBro in a pram outside the shops (which was a normal thing to do in the 70s). She walked home then remembered she had a baby and raced back. No harm done luckily, but it is easy to do on autopilot.

I don’t think it is forgetting the existence of your child at all - it is forgetting they are with you.

From reading the article, it is when something is out of routine - so a parent who doesn’t normally do the drop off is meant to do it, forgets and drives straight to work, or there are roadworks which distract them, or something like that.

I have never forgotten DS, but I have headed to our old house not our new one out of habit (shortly after we moved), taken the wrong exit on the roundabout because I always turn off there for work, etc etc. This is just that kind of mistake writ large (which is why it is rare).

Stop it!!

'I have never forgotten DS, but I have headed to our old house not our new one out of habit (shortly after we moved)'

Yes a momentary lapse. But you didn't use your old keys to get in to your old house and sit there for 10hrs as this person did when they went to work? We all have odd lapses, usually fleeting and without any impact on the safety of anyone else.

You also wonder where people are parking I'm sure I'd notice if there was a distressed dc alone in a car as I walked past it.

I think it’s kind of like if you usually walk to the shops but drive one day, come out and walk home then get home and wonder where your car is

Absolutely could happen to anyone, just muscle memory really.

I agree. I haven’t ever forgotten a child, but I can imagine that it’s possible. I can also imagine DH forgetting because he does go on auto pilot when stressed. My dc didn’t go to nursery, and I didn’t work when they were small, so thankfully these situations didn’t arise for me, but if my life had been different maybe they would have. Of course I like to think that if I’d got to work, I would have suddenly had the realisation that the baby was in the car, but I also know that probably depends on what sort of work you do. Rushed, harassed, extremely busy or highly focused, a nurse or a doctor in emergency care might not think about it as they have to focus completely on the job in hand.
I suppose I don’t find this very difficult to imagine. I am a very protective mother as is DH a father, but I’m quite scatterbrained, and he can be single minded, I can imagine this happening to us, to people like us.
Having lost a close family member very suddenly as a young adult, I feel as humans we are all a hair’s breadth from tragedy all the time. We do our best, and very occasionally that isn’t enough, because we are animals and we make mistakes.

You can get all scientific about it but it won’t change the fact it most certainly will not happen to me. I remember putting my DD in the car therefore I remember to take her back out again. She’s a fucking human being for crying out loud not an inanimate object I just threw in the car without second thought.

Yeah, bloody science. So inconvenient when it tells us stuff we don’t want to hear 😂

I think we need to understand how the 'belief in a just world' fallacy works.

If the world is just, this awful thing happened to that person because they somehow deserved it or caused it due to not being a good person. I am a good person, so this will never happen to me.

^ This is a comforting way to think.

Of course, the reality is that the world is not just. But admitting that means admitting that I - a good person - could have this awful thing happen to me because I am just as fallible as every other person out there.

^ This is not so comforting, but it is more accurate.