Muscat: A toddler asphyxiated to death after being left in a locked car for several hours in Khasab in the far north of Oman last Thursday.
According to the Royal Oman Police, the victim was a two-year-old boy whose father and older sibling unwittingly left him behind in the vehicle with the doors and windows sealed tightly shut.
The unfortunate mishap came to light when family members rushed the collapsed infant to the nearby hospital which pronounced him dead on arrival.
Local police who were alerted about the incident said the child was apparently left behind in the vehicle at around 1pm on a hot Thursday afternoon, while the father and another son got out of the car.
At the father's instructions, the five-year-old son locked the doors without noticing that his younger sibling was still in the vehicle.
The tragic discovery was made some four hours later, by which time a combination of heat and dehydration had claimed the life of the child.
In a statement, the police warned that instances of fatal deaths involving children left behind in locked cars are not entirely uncommon in Oman.
