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ed11563


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Car Seats and Winter Coats: Are Your Kids Safe?
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http://bestride.com/blog/car-seat-safety-winter-coats/28208/

 

 

Car Seats and Winter Coats: Are Your Kids Safe?

Posted on December 17, 2015December 16, 2015 by Nicole Wakelin

If there’s one thing every new parent learns the second their kid is born, it’s how to properly secure them into a vehicle. You can’t even leave the hospital without doing this right and it’s a struggle parents quickly figure out. But what if you’ve been doing it wrong and never knew?

 

The clothes kids wear from season to season change. Despite the warm weather in much of the country, winter is definitely here and that means hats, mittens, and those bulky winter coats. That last one, the winter coat, is where you may unknowingly be putting your child at serious risk.

The minute kids put on those coats it requires some adjustment to their car seat straps. You simply cannot squish them under straps that were adjusted to hold them in nothing but shirts or light coats. Larger winter coats change the equation and that’s the problem.

Adjusting those straps around a winter coat, even if they’re nice and snug, doesn’t properly secure your child. In the event of an accident, your child could slip out of their coat and their car seat.

According to Autoblog, loosening the straps to accommodate additional clothing is a bad idea. That coat might stay in place, tangled in the straps, but your child can shoot right out as if they weren’t secured at all.

The solution is an easy fix. Take that coat off before you buckle-up. Once your child is secure, then you can drape the coat over them like a blanket or even bring a blanket in the car to tuck around them if that’s more comfortable.

It’s not just kids who are at risk from bulky coats. Yes, the same problem applies to adults and older kids buckled into traditional seat belts without any kind of car seat. All that extra bulk lets bodies slip free during accidents.

This video shows what happens in an accident at only 30 mph. The dummy child is wearing a bulky coat and looks to be properly secured. The video shows how the opposite is true.

It might take a few extra seconds and it might mean being a bit chilly in the transition to their car seats, but it’s worth the inconvenience. This winter, make sure your child is safe in their car seat and ditch the bulky winter coat before you snap those buckles.



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It takes me five minutes just to get a winter coat onto a 2yo, never mind zipped up and hood tied.
HOW do they simply fly out of a coat????

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chef


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Dona Worry Be Happy wrote:

It takes me five minutes just to get a winter coat onto a 2yo, never mind zipped up and hood tied.
HOW do they simply fly out of a coat????

 They don't fly out of the coat (usually). They fly out of the carseat. The extra bulk of the coat adds space between the harness and the child's body. In an accident, the coat compresses and causes the harness to be too loose and, thus, causing the child to fly out of the seat.



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I saw this on the Today Show, I few days ago.

It was shocking.cry

Cover the little one with the coat, or a blanket.

Don't let them wear a heavy coat, in the car seat.

It really does make the car seat unsafe.cry

(I did it all the time, when we lived in Ohio. I had no clue. And happily, we never had a crash, so my kids lived.)



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chef


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There are lots of things that make a car seat unsafe that people don't think about. Those strap covers by baby's shoulders? No-no. But, a lot of people use them. Anything not explicitly approved by the car seat manufacturer is dangerous and can make it so the car seat can't do its job. Car seats are also to be replaced after an accident.

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chef wrote:
Dona Worry Be Happy wrote:

It takes me five minutes just to get a winter coat onto a 2yo, never mind zipped up and hood tied.
HOW do they simply fly out of a coat????

 They don't fly out of the coat (usually). They fly out of the carseat. The extra bulk of the coat adds space between the harness and the child's body. In an accident, the coat compresses and causes the harness to be too loose and, thus, causing the child to fly out of the seat.

 This...so I bought car seat covers to warm Sweetness and Bruiser....



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flan327


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I did not know that.

flan

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I can't believe I survived into adulthood riding unrestrained in the back of a station wagon. Does anyone remember when they had that extra seat back there that faced backward?

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Nobody Just Nobody wrote:

I can't believe I survived into adulthood riding unrestrained in the back of a station wagon. Does anyone remember when they had that extra seat back there that faced backward?

 

We never had a station wagon, NJN.

The car seat, that I remember, hung over the front seat of the car, with the baby facing backward. (Into the backseat area.)

Anyone old enough to remember those?biggrin 



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Ohfour


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I understand. Its a different world. Car seats have levelers. If you have an accident, your car seat is comprised. Total BS. 8 year olds in car seats...BS. over it...

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Did you know car seats have an expiration date? Blew my mind when I saw it.

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I knew car seats had expiration dates. You pretty much need to get a new one if you have a new baby. They're only good for three years. And yes, your child pretty much has to be in a car seat or booster seat until about eight.

I get it. I understand. Different times. I dunno. I just wonder how we survived sometimes.

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chef


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Domestic Engineer wrote:

Did you know car seats have an expiration date? Blew my mind when I saw it.

 Yup. They're good anywhere from 3-10 years. Depends on manufacturer.



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Nobody Just Nobody wrote:

I knew car seats had expiration dates. You pretty much need to get a new one if you have a new baby. They're only good for three years. And yes, your child pretty much has to be in a car seat or booster seat until about eight.

I get it. I understand. Different times. I dunno. I just wonder how we survived sometimes.

 Right? Unsafe seats, if we had one. Playing outside unsupervised. The horror! But it was fun!



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We even drank from all water hose. Those were the good old days...

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You're also not supposed to put the car seat in the child seat part of shopping carts. They're not designed to click onto the cart and it can damage the clicking mechanism on the seat. Putting the seat there also makes cart top heavy and unstable.

The infant seat we had for DS had a level. The blue part of the dial had to be showing in the window for it to be properly positioned.

If your child's head is within 2 inches of the top of the seat, your child has outgrown the seat's height limit and you need a new seat.

It's now being recommended to rear face for a minimum of 2 years due to how long it takes the C1 and C2 vertebrae to fuse correctly. Children who forward face before the C1 and C2 vertebrae fuse properly risk being internally decapitated in the event of an accident.

Chest clips are to be at armpit level. Putting them over the stomach can cause internal injuries in the event of an accident.

You should be able to pinch no more than 1 inch of the strap between your thumb and index finger at the shoulders to ascertain if the straps are tight enough.

The seat should have no more than 1 inch of wiggle room at the belt path.

Rear facing - straps at or below shoulders. Forward facing - straps at or above shoulders.

We had a CPST teach us how to install and use a car seat properly. I learned so, so much. Way more than I ever thought would be something to know about car seats.



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Nobody Just Nobody wrote:

We even drank from all water hose. Those were the good old days...

 Water hose water was the best!

My dad had a truck with jump seats in the back seat when I was growing up. I'm not even sure those are legal anymore. A broadside collision could've broke my back. I looooooved vacations in that truck though. I would stretch my legs out and rest my feet on the cooler we'd put in the backseat.



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NAOW


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I am a car seat safety fanatic. That is not something I will mess around with.

I put baby A in without a coat and either put the coat on backwards after she is strapped in or just use a blanket.

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NAOW, I am not making fun. Well, maybe a little bit. I DO recognize the seriousness of car seat safety and I don't take it lightly. I would never not put a child in a car seat. We certainly all wear our seat belts when we leave home. Even in the back seat and even the older kids. Not an option. But I am much older than you and I remember riding in station wagons where we were literally hanging out of them.

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I HATE wearing a coat in the car, and I can only imagine it is worse for kiddos strapped in those car seats. We just take our coats with us - don't wear them in the car. That is one of the things I like about the south - that is a daily option.

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Oh FFS.

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I've gone through three car seats. Preemie seats, infant seats, toddler seats which converted to booster seats. They are required to use them until age 8. They wear winter coats in them. Never thought anything of it.

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Nobody Just Nobody wrote:

We even drank from all water hose. Those were the good old days...

We ran with scissors.

 

We ate Pop Rocks and drank Coke. 



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I still do both.

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Running with scissors while eating pop rocks and drinking coke and making a face.

That's the rebel thing to do.


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