NHTSA urges parents to recheck car seat safety during awareness week

During Child Passenger Safety Week, observed September 20 through 26, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Ad Council have launched the “They Grow. You Check.” campaign. The initiative urges parents and caregivers to regularly re-evaluate car seats and booster seats as children grow, emphasizing that height and weight limits are often more critical than age alone.

NHTSA recommends checking seat labels for maximum limits, ensuring proper installation, and verifying harness fit and tether use. Signs that a child may have outgrown a seat include difficulty tightening the harness or the child’s shoulders rising above the appropriate harness slots.

In addition to proper restraint selection, safety experts highlight the risk of seat-back failure. This occurs when a front-seat occupant’s seat reclines or collapses during a collision, which can reduce available space and cause serious injury to a child seated directly behind the failed seat.