Over the past week, the Weyburn Fire Department has responded to two calls at two separate locations about a person who was stuck in an elevator. Fire Chief Trent Lee said it is very rare the WFD does get a call about a person trapped in an elevator, but it does happen from time to time.
In the rare instance a person does get trapped in an elevator, Lee said the best thing to do is remain calm.
“Just don’t try to leave the cabin without first being cleared to do so by a certified technician or fire department,” Lee explained. “You just want to remain calm, and a lot of elevators do have a call button that you can use or a telephone. And, in today’s society, 99 percent of us have a cell phone so you can call 9-1-1 for assistance.”
The closest most people have gotten to being trapped in an elevator is watching it in the movies. Lee pointed out that fiction is nowhere close to fact in this instance. For example, some of the tropes in the movies include climbing up onto the top of the elevator car through an easily accessible hatch on the ceiling, or someone getting seriously injured trying to climb out of the elevator through a narrow opening, and then the brakes give out.
“A lot of elevators do not have those access panels in the roof,” the fire chief clarified. “I mean, that’s something we see in a lot of movies. A lot of elevators within Weyburn don’t have those access panels that are easy to open by just pushing them.”
As for the brakes giving out causing further injury?
“We won’t see that happen around here,” Lee stated. “Most of our elevators are on a hydraulic system.”
Remaining calm and calling for assistance is the best thing to do, Lee emphasized.
“There’s multiple different things we can do, depending on the scenario,” Lee said. “First of all, we just try resetting the elevator, make sure that it’s just not stuck for some reason. We do have significant training in elevator rescue. We have special tools that’ll allow us to gain access to the cabin or to the elevator itself and allow people to get out safely.”