Elderly Couple found dead in home elevator. It was stuck between the 2nd and 3rd floor.
They must of been extremely wealthy to have a 3 story house with elevator. Especially an elevator that fits two people. Usually home elevators are tiny and are meant for one person only.
Such a sad senseless way to die. If only one person got stuck the other could have telephoned for help. The article says they had complained about mechanical problems. There was no reason for both riding at the same time.
I wonder if a cell phone would work in an elevator? I don’t recall trying mine before.
I am going to say there are worse ways to go. They died of heat exhaustion, not starvation, and both lived a very long time. They were most likely spared the pain of losing the other because they were probably both unconscious when they died.
Depends on the building’s construction and what’s on the floors around it. If a cell phone worked in the rest of the house I don’t see why it wouldn’t work in a home elevator.
The elevator was probably installed years and years ago, before telephones were put in elevators. It may be an older house that they bought and it came that way.
There’s another lesson here, besides emergency phones. If you notice something odd with your neighbors (like the watermelon and the newspapers), check it out. I don’t fault the neighbors, but they’re probably wondering “What if”.
That is really upsetting. One of my dad’s law partners was visiting the firm’s new building and fell through an empty elevator shaft to his death, such a horrible way to go on what should have been a day of celebration for him.
It’s possible the couple weren’t super rich but rather were mobility impaired; an elevator is more common when the homeowners can’t use the stairs for medical reasons.
And if you have an elderly friend or relative, make sure you check on them every day. If the son was in the habit of calling his parents every day, maybe they would have been found and rescued in time (not that I am blaming the son - who would ever expect this to happen?)
Obviously most older folks don’t have to worry about getting trapped in an elevator, but there are a lot of stories of elderly people breaking their hips and not being able to get off the floor to call for help. When someone is that old, younger folks should definitely try to keep an eye on them.
According to an article I read, the elevator was installed before the building code required emergency phones in private elevators.
And apparently, the son was accustomed to his parents not always answering the phone, since they had a fairly active social life (and also couldn’t always reach the telephone before the answering machine picked up.) Who knows? He possibly spent many hours arguing, asking, and begging his parents to keep a cell phone handy in case of emergency. I know that’s the case with both my grandmother and with my grandfather-in-law. (In Grandmother’s case, even a couple of falls can’t convince her that a cell phone is a good thing. Last month, she fell in the bathroom, and fell INTO the bathtub. Spent at least two hours unable to get up before someone dropped by. And once she fell outdoors, and suffered mild hypothermia along with her broken hip before being found. Still won’t carry a phone or use a medical alert device. Stubborn old hag! :smack: )
They do sound like nice people and this must be a sucky way to die. Still, it sounds like they had very full lives and they were about 90. I’m sure that’s a comfort.
True, but in this case I doubt it would have mattered. By the time there were two newspapers piled up at the door they were probably gone.
What a shame. Up here we have Life Alert for the elderly. It’s a bracelet with a button they can push for emergency assistance. My clients 93 year old friend fell on stairs and was yelling for an hour before they found her with a broken leg. Too bad this couple didn’t have it.
My client doesn’t wear hers half the time because she says it makes her look old. I’m telling her this story.
Do even you actually carry your cell phone around the house with you? I certainly don’t. It sits on the table 95% of the time. If something happened to in my house me that made me immobile, it’s highly unlikely I’d have my cell phone on me.
One day, the five of us headed out for lunch and took the elevator. On the way down, one of us started jumping up and down. The elevator stops. No big deal; at least we know the safety system works. We’ll just press a button and head on our way. We don’t. More presses on the button are made in vain. No go.
Now what? Of course! We’ll use the emergency phone! Bet you we’ll be the first to use it. We open up the door, and find a phone that has no dial ring or touch pad. You’re suppose to pick up the receiver and it automatically dials a number. We get a busy signal. We hang up. We try again–still a busy signal. We now have the bragging rights to confirm that indeed this is the first time the phone has ever been used. In a bad way. (This was before before cell phones came into wide spread use.)
The next ten minutes has all five of us arguing how to get out of this predicament. I learn an important lesson–it doesn’t take long for five technical people to start getting irrational. Like “Lord of the Flies” irrational. Finally, one guy just turns around and starts jamming the inner doors open. We’re stuck between floors. Another guy helps and opens the bottom outer doors. We jump out, hoping that the elevator doesn’t jaw us, while trying to maintain a “casual” attitude. It was as subtle as a Marx brother’s movie–people just stopped and stared at us as we spilled out. Later we found out that no one had ever bothered to hook up any of the elevator’s emergency phones in the building. It had an elevator inspection certificate (wouldn’t checking the emer. phone be part of the inspection?).
Since then, whenever I worked in a building with an elevator: 1) Whenever someone starts jumping, I’ll snap at them in a very loud voice to stop, and 2) I check to see if the phone works.
Had the circumstances been more dangerous (like a fire), the above story could have been just as bad for us, as it was for the couple. I didn’t see the panic coming at first when we first got stuck, but it was palpable by the time we got off.
Good story.
Our daughter has another family that has practically adopted her. The dad is an elevator repairman. I am getting a kick out of these replies…
One of my dad’s law partners was visiting the firm’s new building and fell through an empty elevator shaft to his death, such a horrible way to go on what should have been a day of celebration for him.