Lifesavers: Girls in semis of national science contest with baby-saving device

Tuesday, April 9, 2002 | 11:11 a.m.

After attending the funeral of a Las Vegas infant who died after being left in a hot car by his parents, 12-year-old Kelsey Hand wondered what she could do to keep such a tragedy from happening again.

A national science competition has given Kelsey, along with classmates Athena Pisanello and Rochelle Taylor, a chance to try to do exactly that.

The girls have created the Baby Beeper, a device that would clip to a parent's keychain and sound an alarm if a baby was left in a car seat. The design has landed the girls, all students at Hyde Park Middle School, a berth as semifinalists in the National Science Foundation's annual competition.

Now in its sixth year, the Making Science Make Sense program asks middle school students to come up with solutions to a specific problem plaguing their community. The more than 2,500 entries submitted this year were whittled to 30 semifinalists. The girls will learn in two weeks whether they are among the 10 teams invited to Walt Disney World's Epcot Center in Orlando, Fla., for the finals next month.

If the girls make the cut, it will be the fifth time Hyde Park has sent a team to the finals.

"They put a lot of time, effort and research into this," said Steve Loyd, a Hyde Park science teacher and the girls' coach for the competition. "I think they have as good a chance of winning the whole thing as any team we've ever sent."

The winners of the national competition get $25,000 to help develop and market their design as well as $5,000 each for college.

The girls decided to target infant car deaths last fall, after one of the deadliest summers in Las Vegas history.

Three babies died in 2001 after being left in cars, and 606 others were rescued by paramedics, according to the Las Vegas Fire Department. Rochelle said she was surprised to learn that many of the rescued infants wound up with serious injuries, including brain damage and organ failure.

"We made our final decision on what we wanted our project to be when we found out how many babies were being hurt, and not just the ones we already knew had died," Rochelle said.

Kelsey said she was particularly affected by the case of a 6-month-old boy who died in June after his parents forgot he was in their car after parking at the office where they both worked.

"Going to a baby's funeral was a horrible experience," said Kelsey, whose family attends the same church as the infant's parents. "No one should have to go through that, especially if there's a way to avoid it."

To back up their idea, the girls sought input from paramedics, law enforcement officials and a meteorologist who explained how quickly sunlight can turn a car into a deathtrap. They also spent time with electronic specialists who brought them up to speed on what technology they could apply to their proposal.

While researching a patent for their invention, the girls discovered several car seat alarms already on the market or in the works, but none that incorporated their design of a key ring alarm, Loyd said. The girls are working on securing a patent for the device, Loyd said.

The Baby Beeper would include a weight-sensor pressure pad in the car seat that would transmit a signal to a small device that could be attached to a key ring. When the baby was placed in the seat, the pressure pad would send a signal to the key ring and activate the warning system. If a parent walked 10 to 20 feet away from the car, the signal would be interrupted and the alarm would sound.

A Las Vegas pastor announced in November her idea for a car seat alarm that would sound warnings in Spanish and English if an engine was shut off but a child not lifted up off the weight plate. Two years ago, a Las Vegas 12-year-old's design for an alarm triggered by a car's interior temperature earned him first place in the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Regional Sciences and Engineering Fair.