Car Seat Installation More Critical Than Ever

Parents are putting their children in danger and may not even know it. Even though experts frequently tell people how to properly install children's car seats parents are still doing it wrong.

Sunday, February 27th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

Parents are putting their children in danger and may not even know it. Even though experts frequently tell people how to properly install children's car seats parents are still doing it wrong.

The number one killer of children in our country, is car crashes. Tests show car seats are useless when parents don't use them correctly. The most common mistakes parents make are putting them in the wrong place, like in the front seat instead of back and using a car seat that's either too small or too large for the baby.

Officials trained in checking car seats, say they are not surprised by the findings. Last week a baby, about a year-and-a-half old, was in her car seat when her mother hit someone head-on on Riverside Drive. The baby is still in the hospital because her car seat was placed in the front seat.

"The deployment of the airbag caused some injuries to the child," says Corporal Ed Jackson.

Leaders from the Centers for Disease Controls say parents using car seats the right way is the simple vaccine which could drastically lower the amount of children injured or killed in crashes.

Corporal Scott Vickers, with the Tulsa County Sheriff's office, is trained to inspect car seats. He found that eight month old Sidney's seat was too lose. But, her brothers were buckled up right. Sidney's parents, this summer, had inspectors check all of their safety seats all three failed and were fixed.

"When he grabbed it and started shaking it, I realized it was not correct. But she had just moved out of her carrier, to a big car seat and we thought we had it done right," says Mary Kay Edward.

Corporal Vickers says the Edward's are doing well, though. Vickers says at the last checkpoint he ran, only four out of more than a hundred seats were installed correctly. Even Vicker's car seats have failed the test. He says the problem is all car seats are different and they all fit into cars differently.

"Read the owner manual of the car and the owner manual of the car seat, those two items together will tell you how to install in their car," says Vickers.

Vickers looks forward to the day, when car makers and car seat makers are all on the same page, and parents start to use common sense.

The government is phasing in new requirements for car seat makers and car manufacturers to create a universal system. All children under six years old must be in a car or booster seat in Oklahoma. You can get your child safety checked by the Safe Kids Coalition on March 2nd from 5 - 7pm at Thrifty Car Sales at 61st and highway 169.