110-degree car kills 3-year-old
The toddler's dad left her there for an hour and a half
An autopsy showed yesterday that the death of a toddler left in a parked car was caused by heat that probably rose to more than 110 degrees inside the vehicle.
Sera Okutani, 3, of Honolulu died of "hyperthermia due to environmental exposure, excessive heat," according to the city medical examiner's report.
The child's father told police that he left her in a child seat in the back seat of the car for an hour and a half Saturday while he visited friends in a Makiki apartment building.
"The father forgot she was in there," said Honolulu police Detective Ted Coons, acting head of the homicide unit that is investigating the incident as an accidental unattended death. Whether a charge is filed will be determined by the investigation, Coons said.
The father brought the unconscious child to the Makiki Fire Station at 11:52 a.m. Firefighters performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation until a city Emergency Medical Services Department crew arrived and tried to revive the child. She was taken by ambulance to Kapiolani Hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
Information on the child's temperature was not released.
The midday temperature Saturday was 81 degrees at Honolulu Airport, according to the National Weather Service.
The temperature within a closed vehicle will increase an average of 41 degrees over the temperature of the air, according to a California study published in 2005 in the American Academy of Pediatrics journal. Researchers found that within 30 minutes the temperature will climb to 80 percent of the peak high.
Even in cooler weather, the temperature inside a car will rise to a dangerous level, according to Drs. Catherine McLaren, Jan Null and James Quinn in the Stanford University School of Medicine study. Having the windows partly open does not slow the process or lessen the ultimate high temperature, they concluded.
Last year, 29 children left in parked cars died of hyperthermia across the United States, according to statistics compiled by the Kids and Cars organization.
Sera Okutani's death was the first hyperthermia death in the nation this year, said Janette Fennell, founding president of the Kansas-based child safety advocacy group.
"We eliminated air-bag deaths when we put kids in the back seat, but we still have the persistent problem of kids being left in overheated cars," she said.
Technology exists that could remind a driver about the little passenger with flashing dashboard lights or warning beeps like those that warn about keys left in the ignition, she said. The Child Presence Sensor was developed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration but has not yet been marketed.
Kids and Cars distributes a low-tech warning device in its "look before you lock" campaign. It offers a vehicle sunshade that when unfolded reminds the driver about the back-seat passenger and acts as a billboard for other drivers, Fennell said.
