3-Year-Old Dies After Being Left in Day Care Bus for Several Hours
A 3-year-old boy was found to have died inside a daycare bus in Houston, Texas, and police say he was likely left behind following a school field trip to a nearby park earlier that day. The boy was found unresponsive inside a sweltering 113-degree bus, as temperatures that day soared to a blistering 97 degrees.
The child's name was among those on the list of children already accounted for once the trip ended, according to KPRC via Star Telegram. Not one of the workers from Discovering Me Academy, including the two caretakers involved with the trip, was aware that one of the 28 children did not get off the bus.
The oversight was realized too late when the father of the boy came to pick him up sometime past 6:30 p.m. Even that late, the deputies who arrived at the scene measured the temperature inside the daycare bus to be at 113 degrees, according to Harris County Constable Alan Rosen.
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It was likely higher during the day when high temperatures outside reached 97 degrees that afternoon. The bus did not have any means of ventilation when parked and locked, and Rosen told the station that it's likely that the boy fell asleep on the way back from the field trip.
"The next thing I know, a few hours later the dad and the owner came out and was crying," Kenneth Brooks, an eyewitness, said to ABC 13 News. "When EMS had him, he was just limp, you know. Right there, I knew the kid was gone. It's a sad day," he added.
The boy was pronounced dead after he was transported to a hospital. Two people, the driver and a worker assigned to supervise the trip, are now in custody for questioning.
"It seems to me this was just gross negligence," Rosen said. "It's just tragic," he added.
