Distressing video caught the moment a New Jersey mom collapsed to the ground after learning that her two-year-old daughter had died. The young girl was left in the family's car for hours in searing 90-degree temperatures.
A WABC news chopper filmed the unidentified mother on the ground outside her home in Franklin Township on Tuesday, August 30, soon after a neighbor said she heard the mom screaming in pain and anguish.
A local police officer can be seen in the video bending down to try to console her, with the footage showing the two of them rocking side to side while embracing tightly.
Parents screaming in pain and anguish following child's death
Neighbors told NBC New York that the mother was so distraught after learning of her child's death. The grieving mom was eventually taken away in an ambulance. Neighbors added that the kid's parents had both been unaware that their toddler had been left in the hot car until police knocked on their door.
Neighbor Treana Huntley recalled in an interview with WABC that they were just screaming in pain and anguish. She heard the dad screaming uncontrollably and then she heard the mom start wailing, really sobbing. She added that it was gut-wrenching to hear that pain from another mother and she would not wish that on anybody.
Officials said that the toddler was discovered in a car seat in the back of the family's gray Honda Civic just after 2:20 p.m. on Tuesday. Officials added that one of the first neighbors on the scene was a local firefighter who attempted CPR on the young girl. The firefighter was not able to revive the toddler, however, as she was pronounced dead at the scene.
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Another hot car death recorded in the United States
According to the Somerset County Prosecutor's Office, further investigation is on-going to determine the exact length of time the kid was in the vehicle, as well as the circumstances surrounding the events leading to the incident.
Sources told NBC New York, however, that the toddler appears to have been left in the vehicle for more than seven hours. It was not clear where the parents thought the kid was at the time, according to the New York Post.
The National Weather Service (NWS) said that the temperature at nearby Somerset Airport at 2 p.m., just before the dead girl was found, was at 90 degrees. That brings the number of hot car deaths so far this year to 22, according to a heartbreaking tally kept by the organization Kids and Car Safety.
The group's Sue Auriemma said in an interview that this is the kind of tragedy that does not discriminate and it has to do with a failure of the brain's memory, in many cases. She added that the worst mistake a parent can make is thinking this can't happen to them.
