Toddler di£s after being ‘forgotten’ inside nursery minibus ‘for seven hours’

A toddler has di£d after being “forgotten” and left on a nursery minibus for around seven hours amid searing temperatures in Portugal. 

The 18-month-old girl was found in a “critical condition” inside the vehicle in Almada on the southern bank of the Tagus River directly opposite the capital Lisbon just before 4pm yesterday, July 23. 

Paramedics desperately tried to revive her, but she was declared de@d at the scene. 

The girl, named only as Sofia, was handed over to a worker at around 8am and was supposed to have been taken to her day care centre, her grandmother said. 

It appears the alarm was only raised by her mum when she went to pick her up in the afternoon and realised she was not there. 

The van was reportedly parked in an avenue called Avenida do Cristo Rei in front of a different facility to the one Sofia attended. 

Her grandmother told Portuguese tabloid Correio da Manha: “We don’t know why my granddaughter was left in a van at this institution, which isn’t hers. 

“The person who had the van k!lled my granddaughter.” 

The creche the van belonged to has been named locally as Colegio Mestre Cuco. 

Temperatures around the time the alarm was raised in Almada were around 27°C. 

There have been no reports of any arrests so far, although Portugal’s Policia Judiciaria police force have been mobilised to take charge of the investigation.