With summer just around the corner, armed with consistent triple-digit temperatures, Tucson Fire is preaching a yearly warning not to leave children or pets in a hot car, ever, even if it's only for five minutes.
"It can take just a matter of minutes," TFD Captain Andy Skaggs said. "Long enough for you to run inside, thinking you just need to grab that milk or butter that you forgot to get at the grocery store, and come back out. That's long enough for them to get seriously injured and possibly die."
There hasn't been a deadly incident involving a child in Tucson in a few years, according to Skaggs. That being said, if parents don't use extra caution, that streak could end.
"Our temperatures in Tucson, just standing outside, can get upwards of 120 degrees," he said. "So, you can imagine in that vehicle that temperature is going to exponentially increase, getting upwards of 150, maybe even 200 degrees."
In 2017, 42 children in the United States died from heat stroke after being left in hot cars, according to the website NoHeatStroke.org. So far in 2018, 6 children have died from heat stroke after being left in hot cars.
