Dubai's finest?

Dubai Police celebrated their 50th anniversary yesterday. And while I am sure the men and women of the police force do an amazing job every day, I got to experience a very disturbing incident today which left me quite upset.

I was walking out of a supermarket with my sister and a friend and we saw a few people gathered around a car. A woman was banging on the window of that car urging her young toddler to press on the key button to open the car.

It seems the toddler (who was no more than a year old I presume) had somehow locked himself inside the car. The keys were inside with him, and the mother was worried sick trying to get her son out of the car. It was 4PM, 38 degrees, and the car was not running which means no air conditioning.

When we walked out of the supermarket, the police were already there. But they were just standing around, doing nothing whatsoever! They did not try to calm the mother down. It did not even seem like they were trying to find a solution.

The woman's husband was bringing the spare set of car keys, but who knew how long that would take?

The only proactive person there was a man who took it upon himself to try to break the back window of the car. The child had already been in the car for about 20 minutes by now, and he was crying so much...it broke my heart! The man even ran into the supermarket to get some towels to shield the child from the scorching sun. He attempted a couple of time to break the back window, in vain. The windows were too sturdy. Again, police were still standing around, doing nothing.

After about 30 minutes of the ordeal, the child was beginning to doze off (or pass out from the heat? Not too sure. Whatever it is, it was scary). Finally, some men got a hammer and banged really hard on the window until it finally shattered. They unlocked the door and took the child out.

I can't believe how passive the policemen were. And it was only as the car window was broken that an ambulance finally showed up. Surely police must have a procedure when it comes to children locked into cars? Especially considering the summer heat in this country?

I'm just glad this whole thing ended safely for the child. What a traumatic ordeal this must have been for him and for his mother.