JEDDAH: A schoolgirl was freed from a locked school bus in Mubarraz, Al-Ahsa, recently after she was forgotten there by the driver, according to a report in a local publication.

A passerby fortunately saw the youngster crying in the vehicle and telephoned the police. When some officers arrived they were able to open the vehicle and let the girl out.

The driver had apparently parked the vehicle meters away from the school and did not check to see if it was empty when the students got out. The girl had apparently fallen asleep on the back seat of the vehicle.

This story is reminder of the tragic death of a six-year-old Arab child in a private school bus in Jeddah last month. Abdul Malik, who was in Grade 3, was forgotten on the school bus and died of suffocation.

The driver in this case had reportedly dropped the children at school in the morning and then parked and locked the van nearby under the hot sun. When he went back to fetch the children at the end of the school day he saw that Abdul Malik was still in the bus.

The tragedy in Jeddah was reminiscent of a similar misfortune in 2010 in Dammam when a five-year-old expatriate girl, Fida Haris, died after being left unattended for five hours in a private vehicle in the full glare of the sun outside the International Indian School in Dammam.

The school subsequently introduced a series of measures to avoid a similar tragedy including a text messaging service to the parents of a child who is absent between 7:30 a.m. and 8 a.m.