By Yuzhou Hu

A four year old girl named Qiqi lost her life after her father left her in the car for approximately nine hours, reports Shine.

The tragedy took place in Hunan Province earlier this week, when the mother of the girl went to pick her daughter up at 5pm. She was surprised to learn that Qiqi never made it to the kindergarten that day. Worried about the safety of her little girl, the parents started searching for Qiqi, only to find the lifeless body of their daughter in their own vehicle.

Qiqi perished from suffocation after being stuck in an extremely hot environment for an exceedingly long time. The mercury rocketed to 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) that day. The temperature inside the car was even higher.

Hu, the father of Qiqi, was the one who drove the girl to the kindergarten. "I received a phone call around 8.46am," confessed Hu. "Then I played on my phone for a while. After I returned home, I just left the car and locked the door. I totally forgot that Qiqi was still in the car."

Image via The Paper

To the astonishment of many, Hu blamed the death of his daughter on the school instead of taking responsibility. 

"Why did the kindergarten not inform us about the absence of my daughter?" Hu was quoted as saying. "They cost me over RMB10,000 every semester. It is the least they could do."

Without a doubt, Hu's irresponsibility infuriated almost all netizens.

"He's not worthy of being a father at all," commented one netizen on the Paper. "It is better for him to spend the rest of his life with his precious phone."

Meanwhile, some netizens pointed out that nowadays there are a great number of parents who are just like Hu and frequently get distracted by smart phones.

"I have seen such phenomenon lots of times," wrote one netizen. "Parents who have zero interaction with their little ones because their eyes are staring at the screens."

The case has now closed with the kindergarten compensating RMB32,000 to the parents of Qiqi out of humanitarianism. 

[Cover image via Pexels]

This article was originally published by our sister magazine Urban Family (WeChat ID: urbanfamilyshanghai). Follow the Urban Family WeChat account by scanning the QR code below. Click "Read more" (阅读原文) below for more Shanghai news and guides from Urban Family.