Strategy To Survive Elevator Fall
 

You and another person are in an elevator which is about to fall three floors

How do you brace yourself?

Do you stand with knees flexed to absorb the impact and sacrifice your ankles and legs?

Do you lay flat to distribute the kinetic energy on the largest possible area?

Do you lay on the other person to use their body as a crumple zone?

I want to Be Prepared.

I've heard that you lay flat, which might be OK unless the sudden stop 1 causes the ceiling or parts of the ceiling to impact you at whatever speed the elevator was falling in which case having your face and internal organs unprotected seems unwise.

The semi squat/crouch might be OK unless you're moving fast enough in which case you're likely screwed.

If you can get the other person to lay still and let you lay on them, that is likely to be the best option, but you probably want your head on their chest or something like that. You don't want to go knocking noggins or having your noggin wrap around their shoulder until it hits the floor.

A tight fetal position might not be a bad idea with one arm under your head and the other on top to protect it from falling debris.

The problem is that if the thing is in a freefall, you're going to be weightless, floating, until the elevator stops which is going to make it hard to get into any position.

THe reason that I say that is I used to work in a building in Houston that while I worked there, had one or two elevators do weird crap 3-4 times. The elevator went into freefall for a bit, I think once it was 3-4 floors, and then the brakes stopped it. In the case when it was several floors, IIRC one woman had a compound fracture of the lower leg afterwards.

I suppose the best case scenario is that the brakes are engaged but inadequate for some reason so you're descending REALLY fast, but not at terminal velocity.

I think your best option is to try to bend over and kiss your aß goodbye and pray that you get really lucky.

If it makes you feel better, falling elevator cars are basically impossible with the centrifugal brakes they have. I mean, I guess that one could fall really slowly and not activate the brake but then who cares?

Elevators can be extremely dangerous in certain situations but not from the car falling. The two most common ways that people die are both gruesome…one is that the doors open and there is no car and people step in anyway and fall to their death. The other one is worse…the car gets stuck and people try to open the doors and climb through the partial opening, (it stops halfway to outer door opening), and elevator suddenly starts moving the wrong way and cuts you in half. Always stay in the car, no matter what.

You just have to time yer jump... MJ will live a bit longer than a white guy...

The landing will get him too :D

Use the F ing stairs.

About 25 years ago I used to represent Schindler Elevator in NYC. I’ve seen every possible scenario when it comes to elevator and escalator mishaps. I don’t have the answer but can say a dropping elevator is extremely rare. The most common scenarios causing injury are abrupt stops and misleveled…either too low or too high when the elevator car stops.

The cases I handled that involved death were cases where the call button is pushed, the doors open, and a person walks into an empty shaft.

My takeaway from that period of my career is….always confirm the elevator car is there and always make sure the car is level with the floor of the building.

I preferred the Les' method :D ... I always took the stairs regardless matter how many floors ... and walked the stairwell round-trip twice a day in my last gig... only 17 floors... I was paid to exercise and avoided elevators usually.

My stairwells topped out at 27 floors tho' ... that doesn't work everywhere else ;)

This will keep me tonight. Thanks.
I like the idea lying on the other person. Or maybe jump on their back for a longer crumple zone.
No sense in both of you dying, am I right?

I take steps to avoid elevators.
The lifts in my building at work are notoriously unreliable.

In Houston there have been people that have had the doors close on body parts and then the elevator moves while the body part is clamped in the doors. There was a person that got their head sheared off that way. Granted, I don't think you should be getting into an elevator head first.

Also, another in Houston, someone got in an elevator during a storm that was causing flooding and tried to go to their car in the basement parking. The flooded, basement parking. That person drowned.

Looks like the best strategy is to not work in underground mining...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_elevator_accidents

I got wasted at a hotel bar in downtown Omaha one night. I went to take the elevator back up to my room and i tried to keep the door from closing with my hand (that was holding a wine glass). The elevator door crushed the glass and i was able to get my hand out of the door in time.

I've used my hand or foot to "catch" a closing elevator door. I've had many folks that were surprised that I went that route. I would NOT use my head to attempt the same thing.

Reading the description of your event, did you end up needing a ton of stitches or reconstructive surgery to put your hand back together? Wine glasses are no joke when it comes to cutting things up when broken.

I stopped trying to catch elevators after that. I’ve seen the subway videos of people forcing their way into a closing door headfirst, but it seems like one can fight their way through those doors.

I ended up unscathed. I would like to think it was my cat like reflexes but the bottom of the glass caught first then buckled, which gave me enough time to get my hand out of that meat grinder.

Damn, lucky break! Thank goodness, that could have been very ugly/bad.

Don't count out the perfectly timed jump at the end!

I ran the numbers: You are safer getting in and out of an elevator than you are doing same in your shower.

Given that, in business, any business, the best strategy to survive elevator "failures" is to never run your yap in an elevator with a colleague if there other people in the car you don't know with you.

Shut up: Zero defect ride.

OK, I didn't run the numbers but...

Don'tcha love doing liability defense work? Its like having a subscription ticket to a horror movie theater, and you get to cheer for the ghouls.
I did fire subro for a brief period. Don't get me started on that...

Ask Sterling Moss

Why?