As temperatures are going to climb this week, it’s important to remember not to leave kids unattended in cars and make sure they can’t accidentally get locked inside one.
Steve Holland is a division chief for Lubbock Fire. He said their trucks will often respond to calls of a report of a child locked in a car.
According to Holland, their trucks are equipped with kits that help get the firefighters inside quickly and safely.
“The guys train on how to open doors,” Holland said. “Now every vehicle is a little different, so you can’t train on every type of vehicle there is, so you have some general basic knowledge you have to adapt to the situation based on what you have.”
How the firefighters respond might depend on the situation.
“If we were to run on a situation where maybe a child had been in there for, you know, several minutes, the temperature was extremely warm, and it was a vehicle that looked like it might take a few minutes to get into,” Holland said. “We might take a window out to go ahead and get that child out of there and into a cooler and safer environment as quick as we can.”
“We have to be very aware of how long the child’s been in there, what the temperatures are, and take the appropriate action to make sure the child doesn’t have any injuries,” Holland said.