BEATRICE – An infant child was taken to Beatrice Community Hospital late Friday afternoon after police said the child had inadvertently been left unattended inside a hot vehicle.

Police Sergeant Wes Henning says the father of the child had left the vehicle to go into work at a north Beatrice restaurant, and apparently had forgotten about the child, who was sleeping in a rear child safety seat.  He said the father apparently had forgotten to take the child to a daycare.  

Beatrice Fire and Rescue was sent to the scene at 5:35 p.m, after Southeast Communications Center had received a call about a five-month old young daughter left in a car for over an hour, at a restaurant parking lot.  

At the time, the temperature was 88-degrees with humidity at 35-percent.  Police officers were sent to the scene along with paramedics.  Ambulance personnel arrived five minutes after the call and took the child to Beatrice Community Hospital, where the child was treated and released.   

As a precaution, authorities summoned a medical helicopter but it could not fly from Lincoln, because of thunderstorms in the area.

Sergeant Henning said the child is okay.   The father was cited for negligent child abuse.