Flicked-switch theory in elevator death
A company is raising the possibility one of its experienced technicians may have accidentally dislodged an elevator-locking device shortly before he was killed.
Brendon Scheib, 54, was crushed to death while carrying out unknown maintenance work on one of two elevators at the T&G Building in Grey St, central Wellington on January 14, 2016.
A WorkSafe investigation found Scheib’s employer, Otis Elevator Company, had adequate measures in place to ensure his safety.
One of its ‘‘cardinal rules’’ was to ensure technicians used two measures to isolate a lift, despite it not being spelled out in the company manual, a coronial inquest at Wellington District Court has heard.
Otis general manager Dwaine Scott revealed yesterday that a company re-enactment showed a technician could knock a pit switch out of place with his or her foot if he or she was climbing or straddling the lift’s internal ladder. Pit switches were used to stop the lift from moving.
‘‘Once you were in that ladder position … it was very easy to knock that stop switch. I mean it’s not 100 per cent. Something else could’ve happened, but it was our best assumption,’’ Scott said.
Building manager Glen Hooker used the same elevator that killed Scheib earlier in the day and said it had been ‘‘shuddering’’.
Strengthening work was being carried out in the building at the time, which often meant the lifts became dusty.
Andrew Gibb, a site manager at Arrow International, which had been contracted to carry out the strengthening work, told the hearing that the building’s lifts often broke down.
Concerns about Scheib’s safety peaked when his ‘‘lone-worker alarm’’ on his cellphone was activated. The alarm, which is the sound of a barking dog, is triggered when a technician fails to log into Otis’ system for two hours.
It was this noise that led a colleague to Scheib, who was crushed between the lift car and shaft.
WorkSafe inspector John Conroy was among the first witnesses to be cross-examined.
He said both lifts – installed in 1928 and modernised in 1992 – were fitted with pit switches that could be pushed in to stop the lifts, and then pushed in and twisted to release them.
Both lifts could also be isolated at the machine room on the roof of the building.
When Scheib’s body was found, neither of the lifts were ‘‘locked out’’ in the machine room, and only one of the pit switches was activated.
‘‘It was unclear whether Brendon had attempted to activate the switch and whether he was too late, or whether – just as the lift has crushed him facing the switch – that the pit switch has been activated then,’’ Conroy said.
Counsel for the Scheib family, Daniel Vincent, asked Conroy whether he thought the switch was triggered accidentally, causing it to crush Scheib against the pit switch stop.
‘‘That’s one possibility. The other possibility is that Brendon has realised what’s happening too late and then attempted to hit the pit switch deliberately, but unfortunately he’s just been too late,’’ Conroy said.