Among the many incidences of children dying from being left in a hot car, one teenager has developed a product that may help.
A New Mexico teenager, Alissa Chavez who is a high school senior from Albuquerque, designed a car-seat alarm system that could prevent parents from forgetting that their child is in the car, according to KRQE.
The Washington Post reported that Chavez began developing the idea for the car seat when she was in eighth grade; it was her science fair project.
For the project, Chavez altered a door alarm to create a system that would alert parents when they got too far away from a vehicle with a child left inside. Her idea grabbed her a win, and she spent the next three years perfecting the design and coming up with a business plan.
In the fine-tuning, Chavez replaced the original technology, and now uses a pressure-sensor system for the car seat.
Here’s how it works-
A sensor pad that is placed under the cover of a child car seat communicates with the parent’s key fob. When the parent gets more than 40 feet away from their car the pad activates, checking for weight. If the weight of a child is sensed, three alarms sound: the key fob, a phone app and the car alarm, reported the Washington Post.
KRQE reported that Chavez said she created the car seat because this is a problem that seems to keep growing.
“I want to put a stop to it because I don’t want families to have to lose their child just because of an accident and I think it’s something that really needs to be out there,” Chavez said according to KRQE.
As of Friday, July 25, 2014, a total of 18 hot car deaths have been recorded this year, according to the Washington Post.
KRQE reported that Chavez hopes her invention will soon be sold in stores.
