Searing heat in KZN kills two tots
Pair in hospital after they were trapped in a car
AFTER having two traumatic miscarriages, an inconsolable mother who lost her only son and niece on Tuesday is devastated by the loss of yet another child.
The children perished after suffering heat exposure while being shut in a car in 31ºC heat in Clermont, KwaZulu-Natal.
Relatives and neighbours poured into the house of Ntokozo Sithole, mother of Bayanda Sithole, 3, yesterday to offer their condolences as she mourned the death of her son.
The cousins, Bayanda and Asiphile Sithole, 2, died after becoming trapped in a car that had been parked in the yard of a neighbour, who is a mechanic.
Two other children who were with them, Ayabonga Sithole, 2, from the same family, and Phiwokuhle Mtshali, 2, who lives two houses away, were admitted to St Mary’s Hospital in Mariannhill. They were in a critical condition when admitted on Tuesday but their condition has since improved.
Yesterday, an aunt of the children, Jabu Khuzwayo, said they had seen and read about such incidents in the media, but never thought that one day it could happen to them.
“It is beyond pain and it is still unbelievable. We saw them lying down there before they were taken to the clinic,” she said.
Khuzwayo said the four preschool children had been playing in the front yard of their house as usual. When Phiwokuhle, who had visited them wanted to go back home, they all left with her.
About 15 minutes after the children had left, there was silence in the yard and Bayanda’s mother went out to look for them.
She went to Phiwokuhle’s home and asked her grandmother if she had seen them. When the grandmother told her she had not seen them, Bayanda’s mother started to panic.
“When she went to the neigh- bour’s house where there are parked cars in for service, she saw them lying on the seats as if they were half asleep. She tried getting them out but could not open the door,” she said.
Khuzwayo said the shocked mother raised the alarm and her screams attracted neighbours, who rushed to help.
“The people managed to break one of the windows and got the children out. They laid them on the ground and splashed them with water. They were making efforts to cool them and to get them awake,” she said.
One of the neighbours rushed the children to KwaDa- beka Clinic, but when they got there, two of the children had already died. The two survivors were transferred to Mariannhill Hospital.
The mechanic, Ernest Phiri, who was at home yesterday, said the Toyota Corolla the children had locked themselves in belonged to one of his customers who had brought it in so he could fix its locks. He had left the car in his yard and, while at his full-time job in New Germany, someone called to tell him about the tragedy.
“I was confused and jumped in the car to go to the hospital. Those children were like my own. While working with the cars, they would come and play and talk to me, and now this has happened,” he said.
“I feel bad that they can just die in this way.”
Phiri said he did not lock the driver’s door “because opening it was a struggle and I had to fix that. I had no idea that something like this would happen later”.
He said the children would play on top and around the old cars “but I was shocked when they told me it was the Corolla, because they have never done that before with a car that had been brought in for fixing.”
Police had opened an inquest docket and are investigating the circumstances around the children’s deaths.