Good Morning.
Last week we didn't see our neighbor and after a day we heard her dog barking so we broke the window and found that she had died about a day and a half before. Anyway I posted about that elsewhere but Sunday, her Brother N Law was cleaning out her house and got stuck in the elevator.
I had a small hydraulic elevator installed outside my condo unit here when I moved in because my wife has MS and can't do stairs. After I did mine, 3 neighbors followed and had them installed.
They are small and really are handicapped, residential elevators and only make 3 stops.
The elderly Lady next to that house heard the guy banging on the door and ran to get me. (They run to get me if they find a snapping turtle on the road, tree down, homeless person, missing person, broken shower, broken sprinkler, broken air conditioner, dead deer, clogged toilet near the pool, space craft, Boeing 747, Nancy Pelosi etc.)
So I go there and talk to the guy through the door and Sunday was a record heat day at about 97 degrees and these elevators are outside the building.
(His cell phone didn't work inside the car and we get lousy service here being on the sea on a hilltop)
I opened the elevator door above him and got on top of the car. Then I removed the light fixture so I could hand him a screwdriver and explained to him how to take apart the electronic door lock inside the door.
After about 40 minutes he was free.
The problem was with the locking mechanism. The stainless steel pin inside the lock that you push up in an emergency unscrewed itself and fell into the mechanism making it impossible to open the door. I am sure the fire department could open it but that would have cost $5,000.00 to repair.
So today I am installing outside my elevator a big gong with a rotating strobe light connected to the Panic button inside the car. I will also try to make the phone inside the cars work and I re designed that lock so it can't happen again. (In my elevator anyway and I will see if I have time to do the other two.)