In the News: Hot-Car Deaths in 2025

By Alessandra Suuberg, Decency LLC

Reports of hot-car fatalities are making headlines across the United States this summer, prompting consideration of technologies to keep people and pets safer when temperatures rise.

Hot-Car Deaths in 2025

This month, NBC 5 in Dallas-Fort Worth reported that three Texas children had died in four days after being “left unattended in hot vehicles.”

Meanwhile, KGET.com reported that a 1-year-old boy died in California after being left in a car. His mother reportedly told police that the car had been left running “with the air-conditioning set to 60 degrees.”

CBS News also reported that two hot car deaths had taken place in Maryland in 2025, as of July.

Last week, CNN reported that a 3-year-old had died while “trapped inside a hot car” in Alabama.

Preventing Fatalities

Last week, CTV News in Canada reported on results of a systematic review by researchers at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, examining the potential for “a variety of technologies” to make a difference when children are left in hot cars.

In addition, ABC7 in Chicago reported this month on “suburban police departments” using “a new tool” at their disposal: “special infrared thermometers that . . . gauge the temperature inside a locked vehicle.”

Earlier this year, LSU in Louisiana reported on a student engineering capstone project, a “smart infant car seat alert system” designed to use “weight and proximity sensors to detect when a child is left unattended in a car.” The student team shared plans to refine their prototype “for easier integration into commercial car seats.”

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