Fire Department Event to Increase Awareness of Leaving Kids in Hot Cars

The Rainbow City Fire Department will host an event Saturday to increase awareness and provide tips to help parents remember to check their cars’ back seats before locking the doors and walking away.

The event was spurred by continued cases across the U.S. of children dying after being left in hot cars.

Firefighters plan to make it fun, but will emphasize an important message: take action to prevent leaving a child in a hot car.

From noon to 4 p.m., Capt. Brad Crosby said, firefighters will be at the Winn-Dixie parking lot, baking cookies in the fire department pickup truck.

Crosby said the fire department will give away free cookies, as well as ideas that can help people to remember children in vehicles.

The “baking” aspect of the event is to demonstrate to people just how hot it can get in a vehicle, he said.

Firefighters have assembled tips that could help people to remember a child in their cars, Crosby said, such as leaving a shoe in the back seat, or putting a purse there, so they will have to look at the back seat before they walk away from their vehicles.

The department also has window stickers with a thermometer that shows just how hot a car gets inside. Crosby said firefighters hope to give one of those to each parent who attends.