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Did you take out your sled and slide down hills/driveways into the street?
I did growing up in Chicago. From the alley that sloped down into down into the street. So did my sisters and all the neighborhood kids. We had a system where a kid or two would be on the lookout and yell, “Car!” if they saw one coming. I guess it worked for us because we all wound up okay.
There's absolutely no reason a child of that age would have to be supervised outdoors. And the idea that 27° is too cold for them to be outside is nuts. Ask any kid who's ever built an ice fort.
I was fortunate growing up in the northeast, we got some great snowfalls, and cold temps. We had a park with a good hill for sledding, plus the streets were usually salted, and cindered so not sled-able. We still had our share of bumps, and bruises. Normal kid stuff. Terrible tragedy, and very sad for the girl, and family, but an accident for sure.
You should visit the upper Midwest during winter. During January, 27 deg F is "so nice" in the area.
IMO 27 degrees with 20 mph winds is not "so nice". It's 10 degrees now, 12% humidity and a low wind. It was not a "so nice" walk to the car. Waiting for the heat to kick in on order to take off these layers. But who cares? This thread is about parents being attentive to what their child is doing outside and not the temperature. This isn't the first one and this won't be the last. With a generation of helicopter parents, this is a situation when the helicopter part should have been in use.
IMO 27 degrees with 20 mph winds is not "so nice". It's 10 degrees now, 12% humidity and a low wind. It was not a "so nice" walk to the car. Waiting for the heat to kick in on order to take off these layers. But who cares? This thread is about parents being attentive to what their child is doing outside and not the temperature. This isn't the first one and this won't be the last. With a generation of helicopter parents, this is a situation when the helicopter part should have been in use.
Hot-house flower wuss.
To those of us who grew up with *real* winter weather this is NO BIG DEAL. Some of us still live in areas that get real winter. It's 2 F outside my house right now with a wind chill warning, and I'm getting set to clean my car off and go to work. 43 years old, half-Norwegian and a native still living in upstate NY - I take this weather in stride.
Schools were closed and the child was 12. At 12 one would expect some common sense to not sled down a driveway into the street. Being attended to is not the issue. Attention to where the child was is the issue. If the schools are closed and it's 27 outside, the child should not have been outside.
27 degrees really isn't that cold. 5 degrees below the freezing threshhold is not unbearable by any means.
A juvenile generally can be unattended playing outside so I’m not sure the parent question is needed unless this juvenile was really young.
I found in another article the child was 9, I think that’s still old enough to be outside unattended in most cases
Yeah, I played outside in the snow around my house, sledding and what not all the time when I was that age. The parents aren't to blame.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pruzhany
If the schools are closed and it's 27 outside, the child should not have been outside.
Huh? That's really not that cold... especially when you're a child and all bundled up playing around in the snow (those high metabolisms--generate more heat than us older folk). Sheesh, my parents must have gotten away by the skin of their teeth being so neglectful to us children. We were running all around outside unattended and many, many times played around in the snow in temps below freezing. Lucky someone didn't call the cops on them ne'er do wells.
Honestly, I think it's far less healthy to keep children under lock and key 24/7. Sometimes these tragic things happen, but that's life in it's brutality. Life's not worth living it's it to be had in a glass cage. You can generate some real whackjobs that way too. It's not a normal or healthy way to live.
Last edited by Basiliximab; 01-05-2018 at 06:09 AM..
Many years ago, it was a 'snow day' and schools were closed in my area and a boy around 11 or 12 decided to ride his bike outside when it was heavily snowing - he went down a hill (prob. about 45% angle) right into a fairly busy street (at times, 2 lanes in either direction) and was immediately hit by a car and killed - his mother was working and he wasnt supposed to be outside riding his bike in that weather but it happened - the driver was totally upset and I remember the boy's mother was consoling the driver. The kid s/h known better but kids are kids and sometimes they don't think, I certainly wouldn't blame the mother either.
I feel sorry for the driver. He did nothing wrong yet will probably have the weight of this death hanging off his shoulders for the rest of his life.
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