Stuck in an elevator

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

This old, frightening and common problem. I was stuck for maybe 5 minutes, so not so bad, and it hadn’t happened to me in over a decade.

What really surprised me was how terrible the emergency system was. There’s a phone button and an alarm button. The former is crucial since cell phones don’t work in that elevator.

Unfortunately the phone was pointless. There was no dial pad. It was really an intercom that I assumed would call the elevator company. I would think that would be a 24/7 number. No one answered, despite the phone “giving up” the first time. Eventually the elevator let me out, and the phone was still ringing.

I walked to the ground floor, intending to march straight to the manager’s office. However, I passed an “emergency panel” in the lobby that was producing a phone ringing noise. Crap. Turns out the elevator phone was just an intercom calling a phone in the lobby. Nobody answered, and if someone did I would have been surprised to be speaking to an ordinary building resident or visitor who couldn’t help. Worse, the 24/7 number that would have summoned help was nowhere near the phone, so it was unlikely that someone in the lobby could have done something.

I went to the manager and told them they need to at least put a sign by the lobby phone so people know what it’s for, plus a phone number to call. It would also help if that number were in the elevator, so you could tell someone who picks up the lobby phone who to call.

And of course the alarm made noise, but nobody responded. It’s not like they could have done something if they had.

No harm done, but recently I read about a senior in Britain who got stranded in an elevator for several weeks. Nobody answered the phone (it was dialed twice) and when they found the victim weeks later they had, unsurprisingly, dehydrated.

I want to avoid the elevators but I have dogs that need walking. So now I have to program the emergency number in the cell phone so I can tell other people who to call.

I hope nobody else has this problem. Is my building just remarkably stupid?

2

Contact the fire department and relate your story to them. Might get you some results.

3

They need to update the system. By ADA requirements, the elevator phone must connect to a dedicated emergency operator, and it must do so when multiple elevator phones are simultaneously dialed. If there are several elevators in the building, I believe they must connect to each other also.

Dennis

4

I am still wary of the elevator I must use in the library where I work.

I got stuck early one morning, when I came in early tomake cakes for a retirement party. Didn’t get out for almost 2-1/2 hours. The emergency phone was not operating.

Almost a year to the day later I came in early on Labor Day, when the library would be closed, to get some bacon grease I’d been saving for a breakfast cookout. Again, the elevator stopped and the phone wasn’t working. And I was in a building that wouldn’t be open for almost 24 hours.

Luckily I was the one who’d been supposed to start the fire at the park, so when others arrived and I wasn’t there they went looking. My car was at my parent’s house. They were out of town. So my sister called the police, who arrived and asked all kinds of questions. Eventually my parent’s van was noticed to be missing, and was seen at the loading dock of the library. My boss was called, and he could get them into the building. But the fire department had to be called, to open the elevator. While all THIS was going on the library director happened to drive by and wondered “WTH?”

After almost five and a half hours I came out of that elevator like a bull out of the chute at the rodeo. I hadn’t been scared, I was just extremely pissed, because the phone didn’t work. Maintenance gets kind of upset at me, because to this day I get on them when the elevator inspection certificate isn’t up to date. But I don’t care.

5

Seriously, this needs to be addressed. As has been posted, folks die from this stupidity.
The building management is putting everyone who enters the elevators lives at risk. This is completely unacceptable.

Since the building management does not see this as a priority, some calls need to be made. If the fire department does not get it done, the building code enforcement team is next on your call list. Keep harassing folks until these issues are remedied.

The first issue is with the elevators phone. It is required that it is monitored 24/7. Keep on them until this is a reality. Check it yourself every so often if there is any doubt in your mind that someone is on the other end of the line. I did when I worked in a tall building.

The second issue is the elevator itself. It needs periodic maintenance as does any mechanical item. Find out whether the building maintenance people have anyone versed in elevator repair on contract to do this. (A handyman does not count.) They should. If not why not?

6

I was in Caracas, and I was trying to catch an elevator. The door was closing, so I stuck my arm in it. The something-in-door sensor did not work, and I managed to pull my arm out before amputation. Christ, I almost shit my pants.

Granted, it was Venezuela, but now I don’t stick my arm in the door anymore. I’ll hit it with my hand while door is still fairly open, but now I am completely gun shy about elevator doors. Hell, I can wait for the next one.