In cities such as New York where high-rise apartment living is a fact of life, so is the daily use of an elevator. Every day millions of people rely on these mechanical behemoths, and although elevators are typically safe, when they aren’t the accidents and injuries can be life-threatening.

Elevator accidents and injuries can be deadly. In New York, dozens of lawsuits are filed yearly due to elevator-related incidents. What makes these lawsuits challenging is finding who is at fault when the incidents occur.

According to The Real Deal who conducted an investigation into elevator issues in New York, they found problems with:

• Landlords hiring mechanics without accredited training because they charge less
• Landlords not maintaining their elevators
• Mechanics with inadequate training
• Inspectors who fail to find hazards, address the user’s complaints, or conduct adequate inspections
• Inspectors missing red flags
• Inspectors falsifying reports

Certain areas of New York such as Albany have pushed for the state regulation to require that all elevator mechanics have a license from an accredited training program. Real estate industry groups, however, have opposed such regulation and prevented their passage.

Since 2010, there have been almost 500 elevator incidents, of which, 48 were seriously injured, and at least 22 died. By New York law, elevators are required to be inspected annually, but the DOB only has 41 inspectors and must contract out the rest to third-parties. As such, many inspections do not get conducted, with the reason being that they could not get into the buildings. Additionally, many audits of these inspectors reports found that alarmingly, the inspectors failed to address the majority of elevator violations.

Injuries from elevators can include concussions, broken bones, paralysis, amputation, and more.

If you’ve suffered an injury or wrongful death due to an elevator accident and need help proving fault, send us a message.