Wednesday, December 21, 2011

front passenger

when i was a child, i enjoy sitting on the front passenger seat of a car because i get a good full view; sitting at the back only offered one view. if you have children, you'll know what i mean & why kids like taking the front passenger seats.

little did i know that, without a seat belt, the risk for injury in a frontal collision is high. nowadays, we have seat belts, air bags as well as car seats for kids that restrain & protect the front passenger.

but these devices are helpful only if they are used. if you have a child sitting on your lap, no matter how well you yourself are restrained & how tightly you hold on to your child, it's as good as not having protection in a collision.

this is what happend to a 4-yr-old child sitting with her mother on the front seat when a collision occured.

it's a broken thigh bone aka femur - not life-threatening but very painful. fortunately, it was the only injury suffered but it could easily have been worse considering that the car was a write-off.

the mother only had a gash on the forehead while the father who was driving the car sustained a similar fractured femur. both had undergone successful surgery.

who should be responsible for this injury to the innocent child?

may you have a safe journey if you're travelling this festive season.

8 comments:

Yvonne Foong said...

The child became the mother's airbag.

doc said...

Yvonne,

OUCH!

maybe i shd re-title this post The New Airbag.

Anonymous said...

I just can't fathom some of the things people with kids do,esp those with young kids. Things like letting the kid play with the fork in the restaurant, or letting kids stand at the backseat and stick their heads out of the sunroof, or this one - very common - putting kid on your lap while you are driving.

I dun have kids of my own but whenever I see things like this, I sometimes feel like walking over and telling the parents off.

doc said...

Cara,

yeah, a moment's fun for a life-time of suffering - that's how i felt about the kids' sunroof antics!

walking over to the parents & knocking on their heads may be more appropriate!

pilocarpine said...

some parents never really take care of their children in the car.

some children can be seen happily putting their head or hands outside of the car, just to enjoy the wind.

just because they think they are immortals, they think their children are immortals as well.

doc said...

Pilocarpine,

either that or the parents are just plain ignorant of the possible dangers.

until the accident occurs.

Yan said...

21 years ago, I had used reliable child seats for my daughter - from rear facing for babies to front facing for bigger babies..

It's unthinkable to see parents carrying their babies sitting on the front seat, and some parents let their children play in front, while the mothers sit at the back.

They call that "giving way to children, making them happy", I call that irresponsible!

I am usually very "angry" when coming to issues like this:(

doc said...

Yan,

we lack awareness, education & enforcement. in Uk & Aust, drivers are fined for not using child seats.

to achieve developed nation status in 2020 remains a distant dream.