Raising Elevator Safety Awareness and Alertness

The past few years have witnessed a much greater focus on the safety aspect of vertical transportation (VT). Numerous factors are involved in unfortunate accidents related to elevator and escalator usage, and pinning the entire responsibility on any one factor would be a kneejerk reaction, at best. The reality is that ensuring safe usage of VT is a collective responsibility. It would be a grave error to not take a balanced view while analyzing various incidents and coming to conclusions.

This issue of ELEVATOR WORLD India has Technology Upgradation and Safety as its theme, with a focus on reducing the scope of human error by adopting new-age progression. The content includes various experts providing their insights about adopting a holistic approach to safer VT, and with good reason.

While technology is, as always, being looked upon as the solution, the human element cannot be overlooked. A sarcastic response to the question, “What causes most automobile accidents?” is, “The nut behind the wheel!” This analogy applies to VT, as well. People having accidents while getting on and off elevators and escalators because they were preoccupied with their cellphones has become a common occurrence. Unsupervised children using elevators as a play zone, inventing games that include opening the grill between floors and “escaping,” is another major cause for concern. 

Elevator maintenance is often assigned to the cheapest service provider without verifying their credentials or capabilities. Major repairs or replacements are put on hold. Temporary fixes are implemented to save costs. As a result, even in cases where wear and tear over the years eventually leads to an accident, in many instances that damage is ignored, even after it’s noticed and flagged during the maintenance process. 

Since it is most likely to have the biggest impact, one of the most important steps that can help change the prevailing status quo is to enhance awareness about elevator safety. Over the past decade, fire safety drills have been held at regular intervals in most buildings, but elevator and escalator safety preparedness has been taken for granted. 

The time has come for all VT industry stakeholders to ensure that the safety aspect is given adequate importance or, at least, adequately monitored using advanced technology such as predictive, preventive and remote maintenance to avoid unfortunate incidents in the future.