On April 17th, the topic "Driving with a Baby: 1-Year-Old Turns into Mom's Airbag" caught the attention of netizens.
It was reported that in March of this year, a woman was driving with her child crying, so she held the child while driving. Due to a driving error, an accident occurred, triggering the deployment of the airbag, which struck the child's face, causing injuries. Fortunately, the accident did not result in serious harm.
Not everyone is favored by Lady Luck:
On October 4, 2017, Mr. Chen and his family were involved in a traffic accident in Suzhou, Anhui Province. At the time of the accident, the mother was holding her newborn baby in the front passenger seat, resulting in the baby being injured by the deployed airbag. The situation was critical, and the baby was rushed to the ICU for treatment.
In March 2019, a car traveling from south to north in Xuancheng suddenly lost control, veering off the road, breaking a small tree, and rolling into a low-lying field by the roadside. During the rollover, the driver's wife and their infant in her arms were thrown out of the window. The wife died on the spot, while the infant in the field and a teenager in the back seat luckily survived.
On November 9, 2022, in Huai'an, Jiangsu Province, a parent was holding a 30-day-old baby girl in the front passenger seat when a sudden emergency occurred. An abrupt brake caused the child to hit the center console. Following a CT scan of the head, it was discovered that the child had subcutaneous bleeding, depressed skull fracture, and a small amount of intracranial bleeding accompanied by brain contusion.
Traffic police remind that minors should sit in the back seat and use child safety seats when riding in a car.
Data shows that in the absence of child safety seats in cars, the mortality rate of child traffic accidents is eight times higher, and the injury rate is three times higher compared to when child safety seats are properly installed. Correctly using child safety seats and other restraint devices is currently the most effective way to protect children when traveling by car.
Many parents prefer to hold their young children while riding in a car, but this is a very wrong practice. Even if the car is traveling at speeds of 30 to 50 kilometers per hour, in the event of an emergency brake, a child weighing 10 kilograms would experience a sudden impact force of 300 to 400 kilograms, equivalent to the weight of an adult bull.
In addition, the passenger-side airbags in some vehicles are designed to deploy according to adult standards. During a typical car collision, which lasts only about 0.2 seconds, these airbags deploy incredibly fast, within 0.02 to 0.04 seconds, with speeds reaching up to 300 kilometers per hour.
For children, the force of airbag deployment far exceeds what their bodies can withstand, potentially leading to fatal injuries such as chest fractures, internal bleeding, suffocation, and even severe issues like neck fractures.
Therefore, when driving with children, never sacrifice the use of a safety seat for the sake of convenience. It's better to be safe than sorry, as tragedy can strike unexpectedly, leaving regrets too late to mend.
