Proper Child Seat Safety in the Winter in Rockaway, NJ

Proper Child Seat Safety in the Winter

Mopar Mike's Blog | Proper Child Seat Safety in the Winter

Tis' the season for the bitter cold, and with that comes the importance of child seat safety!  Most parents want their children to stay warm, so it would make sense to dress them in those cute poofy coats, because they thermalize well.  Right?  Most parents don't know that by doing this they may be putting their child in danger if they are involved in a motor vehicle collision!

Poofy coats on infants and toddlers are not a good idea in the winter if you can help it.  Most parents in the hustle and bustle of the day to day routines, will dress their kids warm, throw one of these coats on their children, then when they go to put them in their car seat, realize they are having a difficult time strapping them in, and will loosen the straps to get the child buckled up.  What they don't realize is if you were to get into a motor vehicle accident, the coat will flatten, and most of these "Poofy" coats also have a slick exterior so they don't absorb snow and wetness, to keep the child dry.  This slick exterior can act like a lubricant.  This material, while flattening out during a motor vehicle accident, can cause the child to be ejected out of their seat.  

When properly fastening your child into their car seat, after the child is buckled into their seat, you should not be able to pinch the buckle straps at the collar bone level.  If you can, the straps are too loose!  To get a proper fit, it is best to remove the seat from the vehicle and bring the seat inside your home.  In the comfort of your home, dress your child in mutliple thin layers utlizing thermals, etc. and adjust the straps of the car seat.  This way, you don't have to worry about fighting with the child seat straps while exposing your child to the elements outside.  Furthermore, it is also important to mention the chest clips!  Proper chest clip location on a 5-point harness is at the nipple line.  If the clips are too high, if you are involved in a motor vehicle collision, it can choke the child, and if they are too low, at belly level, it can cause internal organ damage in an accident.  

Lastly, I also want to point out that if possible, don't position your child's car seat in the rear middle seat.  I understand it is convenient as it's easier to reach for baby if you need to adjust bottles, pacifiers, blankets, etc.  Just because it's more convienient for you, doesn't mean it's best for baby!  For those of you that don't know, I used to be a firefighter/EMT for over 10 years.  During my time in emergency services, I once was dispatched to a call where a tree fell across a highway, and a mother crashed into the tree trunk.  You can imagine what type of impact this was.  To make matters worse, mom was unconscious upon our arrival, and the car seat was ejected out of the vehicle with no site of baby.  Might I add there was also a "baby on board" placard on the rear window!  Not knowing if baby was initially on board or not, and mom being unconsicous, we started combing the wooded areas around the highway searching for baby, praying that we wouldn't find anything.  Luckily, we found out after contacting family that baby was not on board and was safe!  If however, baby WAS on board, baby would have been ejected out of the windshield.  This is why I don't like car seats in the middle seats, and why I also hate those placards! 

Here are some overall safety tips for the winter months!

1)  Utilize Multiple Thin layers:  Instead of a big poofy jacket, dress your child in  multiple thin layers.  Many thermal companies now make thermal shirts and pants for the whole family now!   A general rule of thumb for dressing your baby for the winter is to dress them in one additional layer than you would for yourself, as their bodies don't thermalize the same as ours because they are so small!

2)  Blankets Blankets Blankets:  If you need to, after dressing your child in multiple layers, bring them out to your vehicle in a blanket, fasten them into their car seat.  After buckling them, you can then place the blanket over your child to keep them warm.  Never utilize car seat covers that go under the child.  Don't ever utilize any items that go in between your child and the car seat that isn't directly from the car seat manufacturer.  There are a lot of items available at the click of a button these days, it doesn't mean they are all good!  While on the topic of blankets, it is also a good idea to keep emergency blankets inside your vehicle for the whole family in the event that your vehicle every gets disabled.

3)  Hands and Feet:  If there is one thing I can't stand, is seeing infants, babies, and toddlers out in winter in strollers, etc with no shoes, socks, or booties!   The human body dissipates heat the most through the hands and feet!  So make sure you keep your child bundled up with socks, shoes, boots, as well as gloves!  Would be terrible for your child to get frost bite or get sick because of something so easy to protect against!

#Mopar #MoparOrNoCar #MoparMike #TisTheSeason #ChildSeatSafety #SeatSafety #KeepWarm #KeepSafe #Dodge #Chrysler #Jeep #Ram

 

 

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