Free Car Seat Safety Inspections Available

WEST SPRINGFIELD — The Kiwanis Club of Springfield and area KEY Clubs have partnered with the Western Mass. Safe Kids Coalition to offer free car seat safety inspections.

The inspection station is conducted in the parking lot of the AAA of Pioneer Valley every Thursday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Appointments for safety checks are required in advance by calling The Professionals at Baystate Medical Center, (413) 794-2255. Inspections take approximately 30 minutes.

The Western Mass. Safe Kids Coalition, headquartered at Baystate’s Children’s Hospital, is one of 30 coalitions across the country awarded a grant from the National Safe Kids Campaign to establish inspection stations in their local communities as part of the Safe Kids Buckle Up campaign.

Motor vehicle crashes are the number-one killer of children ages 1 to 14, causing more than 1,700 deaths and another 264,000 injuries to children each year.

A study has found that most parents attending child safety seat checkups in Western Mass. continue to make mistakes while using child retraints, from not securing the seat belt tight enough to improper use of the harness strap.