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© History Oasis
Prepare to be shocked and amazed by these infamous cases of famous elevator accidents and falls that have defied the odds.
Challenging engineering and sometimes even rewritten the record books.
On July 28, 1945, a B-25 bomber crashed into the Empire State Building due to thick fog, killing 14 people and injuring 24 others.
The elevator operator Betty Lou Oliver survived a 75-story fall when the elevator she was placed in after the initial crash plummeted to the basement, setting a world record for the longest surviving elevator fall.
A housekeeper spent an astonishing three days trapped in an elevator in a billionaire's $20 million New York City townhouse, surviving without food or water until she was rescued by chance when a delivery person became concerned.
The incident, which occurred in January 2019, led to an "aggravated violation" being issued by the New York City Department of Buildings.
In November 2018, six people in Chicago experienced a harrowing 84-floor elevator drop in the former John Hancock building when two cables broke, plummeting from the 95th floor restaurant before stopping between the 11th and 12th floors.
In a dramatic two-hour rescue, firefighters had to break through a brick wall in the parking garage to reach the trapped individuals, including a pregnant woman and two law students, as the express elevator had very few openings.
On January 24, 2015, an elevator mechanic was fatally crushed between two elevators while working in a luxury tower on New York's Upper West Side.
The building had three pending elevator-related code violations at the time, and repairs had been ongoing for four months, with the owners opting to fix elevators one at a time rather than shutting all four down simultaneously.
In 2003, an aspiring missionary doctor, tragically died in a horrific elevator accident at Christus St. Joseph Hospital in Houston, Texas.
The 35-year-old surgical resident was decapitated when the malfunctioning elevator doors closed on his shoulders and the car suddenly moved upward, trapping a witness inside for 15-20 minutes and causing shock and disbelief among hospital staff.
In 2011, a horrific elevator accident in New York City claimed the life a 41-year-old advertising executive, when she was crushed between the elevator and the shaft wall as the elevator unexpectedly ascended while she was entering.
Bizarrely, this tragedy occurred just days after a similar incident in California where a university employee was killed trying to escape a stuck elevator.
In 2017, a horrific accident occurred at a Seville hospital when Rocío Cortés Núñez, a 25-year-old mother who had just given birth by C-section, was tragically killed after being crushed in a malfunctioning elevator.
The elevator began to rise with its doors still open as Núñez was being wheeled out on a hospital trolley, trapping part of her body and reportedly even severing her head, all while her newborn daughter was with her but miraculously unharmed.
In 2016, a Chinese woman tragically starved to death after being trapped in a broken elevator for a month during the Chinese New Year holiday, with her mangled hands indicating desperate attempts to escape.
This horrific incident in Xi'an sparked outrage over negligence, as elevator maintenance workers had simply shouted to check if anyone was inside before shutting it down.
The woman's family didn't take further steps to find her, believing she had just gotten lost somewhere due to her reported mental illness.
In August 2019, a tragic incident occurred at a luxury apartment building in Manhattan when a 30-year-old man was crushed to death by a malfunctioning elevator that suddenly dropped as he was exiting.
The elite Alye Parusa residential complex in Moscow was the site of a tragic elevator accident in 2016, where a woman died after the elevator floor collapsed into the shaft.
Despite winning numerous awards, this luxury complex became the scene of a horrific malfunction that exposed the potential dangers lurking even in high-end urban developments.
In January 2020, a young couple in Tel Aviv tragically drowned when their basement elevator became trapped during severe flooding, in what the mayor called a "once-in-50-years" downpour that dumped 100 millimeters of rain per hour.
Prosecutors closed the investigation without finding criminal fault, stating they could not determine it was possible to prevent the "tragic outcome"—a decision the victims' families called "inconceivable".
In the late 19th century, decapitations by elevators were shockingly common, with at least 16 documented cases between 1880 and 1900.
Among the most gruesome incidents were a 14-year-old boy whose head fell to the basement while his body remained on top of the elevator—and a woman who, after being practically decapitated, managed to stagger to her room before collapsing dead.
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