Elevator Terror: Man Crushed Between Shaft And Wall In NYC

An unidentified man died in an apartment building in New York City on Thursday after an elevator suddenly dropped, crushing him inside.

Authorities said that, around 8:30 AM, the man was getting off in the lobby of the apartment building located in Kips Bay neighborhood on the East Side of Manhattan, when the elevator malfunctioned.

FDNY Deputy Chief Anthony Arpaia said that the elevator, which was occupied by seven people, suddenly dropped from the lobby level toward the basement. This caused the victim to get stuck between the elevator car and the shaft wall on the first floor.

“Some people were still left down in the car after it moved down in the basement,” Arpaia said. The passengers, however, were safely rescued and brought out of the car from the basement.

“The FDNY had to work really hard to get the car moved.”

The 30-year-old victim, a resident of the building was pronounced dead on the scene by the city’s Medical Examiner. The surveillance system captured a video of the unfortunate event, which police are now reviewing.

The incident occurred in the 23-storey Manhattan Promenade, which had been reportedly fined nearly $1,300 because of unsafe elevator conditions.

The New York Times reported that inspectors have found that a safety feature on one of the elevators in the building had been disabled or tampered with and recommended that the building stop using that particular elevator until the issue is addressed.

It was not clear though if the victim was riding on the flawed elevator.

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Elevators are generally safe for the public but accidents still occur. A 2006 data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Consumer Product Safety Commission showed that incidents that involve elevators and escalators cause about 30 deaths and about 17,000 injuries in the United States per year.

Elevators account for nearly 90 percent of the deaths and 60 percent of the serious injuries. Most of the victims are people working on or near elevators, including those who install, repair and maintain these transportation devices.