Winter Storm Travel Alert: Four Must-Know Car Seat Safety Tips from Buckle Up for Life

CINCINNATI--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- The Northeast and Mid-Atlantic regions are bracing for a powerful storm that could bring a foot or more of snow, making driving conditions potentially dangerous. It is critical that drivers take precautions to ensure child passengers are correctly strapped into their car seats, which can reduce the risk for injury or death in a crash.

To help families keep children safe, Buckle Up for Life, the national child passenger safety program from Cincinnati Children’s and Toyota, has issued the following must-know winter safety tips. Please feel free to use these tips in your coverage of the blizzard, attributed to Buckle Up for Life.

1. Be Aware of Travel Warnings and Advisories from Your Local Officials. Know before you go: be sure to stay informed about – and follow – any travel warnings or advisories issued for your area.
2. Safety-Check Your Child’s Seat Using the Inch Test and the Pinch Test. Pinch the car seat strap near the child’s shoulder; if you can pinch a wrinkle in the fabric, tighten the strap until it is snug. For the “Inch Test,” grab the car seat toward the back and bottom and tug from side to side and front to back. If the seat moves more than an inch in either direction, tighten it.
3. Remove Your Child’s Winter Coat. Before securing your child in their car seat, remove their winter coat. A coat can prevent the harness from fitting correctly. It also could compress in a crash, compromising the seat’s ability to protect your child.
4. Secure Loose Items in the Car. Make sure all loose items – particularly winter weather essentials such as shovels and ice scrapers – are tightly secured in your vehicle. These objects could become projectiles in the event of a crash.

These tips are part of Buckle Up for Life’s mission to educate families about the proper use of car seats and seat belts and to provide free car seats to families in need. Over the last ten years, Buckle Up for Life has grown to include a network of 14 of the nation’s leading children’s hospitals and has educated more than 23,000 people.

Gloria Del Castillo, child passenger safety expert at Cincinnati Children’s and senior outreach specialist for Buckle Up for Life, is available for interviews to discuss these tips as well as additional insights on keeping child passengers safe during the impending snow storm and beyond. For more information, visit buckleupforlife.org.

About Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center

Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center ranks third in the nation among all Honor Roll hospitals in U.S. News & World Report’s 2015 Best Children’s Hospitals. It is also ranked in the top 10 for all 10 pediatric specialties. Cincinnati Children’s, a non-profit organization, is one of the top three recipients of pediatric research grants from the National Institutes of Health, and a research and teaching affiliate of the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. The medical center is internationally recognized for improving child health and transforming delivery of care through fully integrated, globally recognized research, education and innovation. Additional information can be found at www.cincinnatichildrens.org. Connect on the Cincinnati Children’s blog, via Facebook and on Twitter.

About Toyota

Toyota (NYSE: TM), the world's top automaker and creator of the Prius, is committed to building vehicles for the way people live through our Toyota, Lexus and Scion brands. Over the past 50 years, we’ve built more than 25 million cars and trucks in North America, where we operate 14 manufacturing plants (10 in the U.S.) and directly employ more than 40,000 people (more than 32,000 in the U.S.). Our 1,800 North American dealerships (1,500 in the U.S.) sold more than 2.5 million cars and trucks (more than 2.2 million in the U.S.) in 2013 – and about 80 percent of all Toyota vehicles sold over the past 20 years are still on the road today.

Toyota partners with philanthropic organizations across the country, with a focus on education, safety and the environment. As part of this commitment, we share the company’s extensive know-how garnered from building great cars and trucks to help community organizations and other nonprofits expand their ability to do good. To date, Toyota has contributed more than $700 million to nonprofits in the U.S. For more information about Toyota, visit www.toyotanewsroom.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160122005135/en/

For Buckle Up for Life
Amy Schultz, 646-805-2825
[email protected]

Source: Toyota

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