An Arizona daycare that was evacuated after a small fire accidentally left a 3-year-old boy alone outside, a report said.
The youngster was “completely by himself” when his mother found him “screaming and crying” outside in the playground of Sunrise Preschools in Phoenix last Wednesday, according to AZFamily.com.
“He was completely red,” the mother, Allivia Schulik, said.
“He was screaming and crying. He was completely panicked.”
Shortly before finding her son, Schulik was told by a daycare worker that the boy’s father had already picked him up, the report said.
But before driving off the mother called the dad, who said he never picked up their son.
The horrifying reality led her to run back to the building.
“It felt like forever to find him,” said Schulik.
“I mean, they had told me someone had picked him up, so the first thing going through my brain is they let someone else take my kid.”
Schulik said that by the time she found the boy, the daycare was already closed for the day.
In a statement to 3 TV, Sunrise Preschools said they experienced a small electrical fire in a staff bathroom, leading to parent notifications and an evacuation.
“Upon reentry to the building, one student was left outside unsupervised on our enclosed playground for about 12 minutes. The child was not injured or harmed,” the statement said.
But Schulik wasn’t aware of the fire, or evacuation, and believes her son was stranded outside for far longer than 12 minutes.
“I think they were trying to play it down,” she told the network.
The teacher responsible for the mishap has been suspended without pay, the daycare said.
Phoenix police said they were aware of the incident, but called it a miscommunication, the report said.