21-05-2025
Baby boy found abandoned in stroller in train station after 'parents forgot six-month-old'
A baby boy was found abandoned in a stroller at a station after his parents reportedly forgot the six-month-old whilst he was asleep.
The blunder happened on Tuesday evening at the Cacilhas South Terminal in Almada, south of the Portuguese capital, Lisbon.
Around 7.15pm a passerby noticed a stroller left abandoned at the station with no adults nearby which led them to call the police, local media Correio da Manha reports.
Officers rushed to the scene and found the baby boy alone but safe and immediately carried out enquiries to find the parents.
One witness described seeing a baby crying 'in a police officer's arms' as a moment that 'really stuck with me and one I'll never forget'.
It was only an hour later that the parents came running into the terminal and explained they rushed out to catch the metro and didn't realise they had forgotten the stroller, with the baby, who had been left behind, a police spokesperson confirmed.
The parents had left a ferry from Lisbon when they split while they tried to catch the metro.
A misunderstanding meant that each parent thought the other had the stroller carrying the baby but failed to double check with each other, Portuguese newspaper Publico reports.
In their rush to leave, the parents left behind the six-month-old and it was only once they realised what had happened that they returned to the station, around 45 minutes later.
Following the alarming discovery and when they found officers looking after their child they were both questioned by police before being taken to a police station and were reunited with the child.
After visiting their home and finding everything in order, authorities determined the child was in a safe environment and allowed the baby to go back home with the parents, who are foreign nationals without legal residency status in Portugal.
One of the women who saw that happened shared on social media, saying the parents arrived almost an hour later, adding: 'He arrived first, she came quite a while afterwards. Something very strange happened there... The officer kept the baby with him the entire time.
'What I know is that both of them were taken away in a police vehicle, and the baby stayed with the officer who held her in his arms and didn't let go for a single minute.
'But I'm still in shock. '
