Ava's Rule

Always remember Ava's rule to keep your young children safe and alive.
Accidents can happend to everyone.

The temperature inside a parked car can be as much as 40C/104F hotter than outside ie. 36C/97F day, 76C/201F inside the car.

75% of this rise occurs within five minutes of closing the car.
90% of the temperature rise occurs within fifteen minutes.
Open windows do not significantly decrease the car's temperature.
Young children ate three to five times more sensitive to heat.
The younger the child, the faster heatstroke and dehydration occur.
Hyperthermia, dehydration & asphyxia can all lead to death.

Teach your children to NEVER enter a parked car without an adult, and show then how to blow the car's horn (if operational when stationary) if they ever become trapped for any reason. Wintihn 5 minutes, the heat inside a ar can make young child too lethargic to act.

The Story of Ava Rosemeyer - Rest in Peace Super Princess

Ava Florence-Beth Rosemeyer was born August 22, 2003 in Autralia, she was very long waited girl after her parents have 2 boys before her. Ava was very loved by everyone around her, she was everyones Super Princess. She was like normal little girl who loved fairies, ballerinas, all sparkly, she did not wnat to wear anything else than pink, but more than anything though, she loved her Grandad.

But in February 03, 2007 everything changed. That day at 10.30 am Ava's mother went next door to Grandads to use the computer there and Ava go with her. She sat right beside her mother while she proofed some photos and at midday Luca asked if they could do some rearranging in his bedroom. Her mother turned the computer off and took the three children back to their own house, but on the way Ava started to pest for something she'd left behind. Her mother said she wasn't going back and said for her to go get it and then come home again. It's only about 10 meters to their grandad's door and they have one big wall around both properties so the kids can roam from one house to the other all day.. She went back to Grandads and her mother went upstairs with the boys and Crayton to do what Luca had asked. They spent an hour there and it did cross her mind a few times that Ava wasn't there helping but she knew she was at Grandads and just assumed she was watching something on TV and having lunch. When they go downstairs, Crayton went next door to get something and Ava's mother heard him call out to the boys to ask if they knew where Ava was. Immediately her mother felt alarmed that she wasn't where she do assumed so she got up and went out the front of our house where Grandad was standing. She said "Where's Ava?" and he said "I don't know.. She said she was going to the car" and before he could finish his sentence, which was to say "and then to your house", she turned and ran to the car which was only parked a few steps away. She immediately found Ava inside and I knew instantly that it was very bad. She had seen only a few days previously a story about children in hot cars and how little time it takes for serious damage to occur. She had been in the car up to 30 minutes - all the while Grandad thought she had go to home and her mother still believed her to be with him. They never park on the driveway normally and the car had been locked but one of the children had got something out of it that morning and not relocked it. They believe she had gone in to get lollies and shut the door to hide and then they thought the child locks had stopped her from getting back out but they were only on in the back. She had been in the front seat at some point so could have opened the doors if she'd tried. Her mother now know that the effects of heat take place so quickly that she probably passed out before she even knew to get out. The next thirty minutes were absolutely chaotic while they desperately tried to cool Ava down with water and waited for an ambulance. It seemed to take forever and to make matters so much worse, one of the boys had plugged a phone into a point upstairs in the hour before rendering their cordless phones inoperable. Her mother could not figure out why I couldn't dial out and had to yell to neighbours to call for them. Ava was still breathing but not conscious and they all felt very, very scared. When the police arrived with the ambulance, it was like a reinforcement that it really was as bad as she thought. Ava was taken to the local hospital where they put her on life support and cooled her body right down in an attempt to limit brain damage and later that night she was taken to the Mater PICU and placed in an induced coma. They were told she would stay like that for a few days and then they would start to raise her body temperature 1 degree at a time and bring her out of the coma. They had to just wait and see just how much damage she had suffered and her mother could not describe the agony that they endured wondering just how their little girl would be. They had excellent support from the Mater, they were amazing, but at the end of the day, no-one could tell to them whether Ava would live or die and whether she'd be anything like the Ava everyone knew. Over the next two days, her statistics improved slightly and they were told there was a good chance she would survive. On Monday they drove down to the Gold Coast to see the boys and Ivy. Only 2 hours later, while they were home the hospital rang to say she had become unstable. They live an hour from the hospital and whilst frantically driving up the highway, we got a call to say she had suffered a heart attack. Her mother knew in that moment there was no hope and by the time we got to her, she had already passed away. There was no clear cause as to why Ava died except the doctor believes she did suffer extensive brain damage which ultimately stopped her ability to control her blood pressure.

Ava died with her Aunty Angie holding her, never leaving her side, whispering into her ear and staying calm. Her aunt helped her to this world and was there when she left us. Ava passed away at February 05, 2007.

http://avarosemeyer.memory-of.com/

MySpace i created for Ava with permission and support from her mother:

www.MySpace.com/ava_rosemeyer