Hancock Building Elevator Plunges From 95th Floor to 11th

It took nearly three hours to rescue six people stuck in an elevator in Chicago’s fourth-tallest building early Friday. Luckily, no one was injured.

Not being a fan of heights, I probably won't ever find myself in that situation, but if I had been in that elevator on Friday, there would have been extensive clean-up needed afterward. Extensive.

Details from CBS Chicago:

A broken hoist rope caused the express elevator to malfunction while guests who had just left the Signature Room on the 95th floor rode down toward the lobby. The elevator and two others have since been closed to the public while repairs are made and investigators figure out what happened.

What kept the elevator from tumbling down to the bottom of the building? Several hoist ropes hold up an elevator car, so if one fails, the others are able to carry the weight.

When rescuers scrambled to find the stuck elevator early Friday morning, there were no openings between floors because of the building’s blind-shaft style layout. The rescue crew had to hammer out a concrete wall in the garage area of the 11th floor.

“It was a precarious situation where we had the cable break on top of the elevator (and) we couldn’t do an elevator-to-elevator rescue we had to breach a wall,” said Chicago Battalion Fire Chief Patrick Maloney.

You might want to think about taking the stairs next time you visit.