You probably don’t think twice before stepping onto an elevator or escalator during your daily activities. Whether you are commuting to work, shopping at the mall, or spending a night out on the town, you assume that the elevator or escalator you are using is perfectly safe and sturdy.
However, in truth, tens of thousands of people are harmed each year using these forms of transportation and dozens suffer fatal injuries.
At Van Sant Law, our elevator injury attorneys are committed to helping injury victims and their families collect compensation and find justice after elevator and escalator accidents.
How Elevator Accidents Happen
Elevator accidents are usually caused by maintenance issues, defective elevator parts, or elevator owner negligence. A large number of elevator accidents take place on construction sites and involve on-the-job workers who are either working on elevators or taking elevators to job sites. Another significant percentage of elevator accidents involves elevator repairmen and doormen.
Elevator injuries may take place due to:
- Elevator door malfunctions
- Elevator floor shifts
- Elevator entrapment
- Elevator shaft falls
- Sudden elevator stops, drops, and landings
- Elevator crush injuries
How Escalator Accidents Happen
While many people know that elevators can be dangerous, fewer know that each year escalators cause serious injury and death, especially among young children. In fact, according to the National Institute of Health (NIH), about 10,000 escalator accidents necessitate a trip to the emergency room each year in the United States alone.
Escalator accidents may take place due to:
- Escalator falls
- Escalator malfunctions
- Lack of escalator warnings
- Escalator collapse
- Escalator entrapment – when a piece of clothing or body part becomes trapped in an escalator
Fight for Compensation With an Experienced Injury Attorney at Your Side
At Van Sant Law, we treat your injury case with the seriousness, assertiveness, and thorough attention that it deserves. The law requires that elevators and escalators are inspected and serviced regularly and that elevator and escalator operators keep their passengers and employees reasonably safe. If these precautions, rules, and regulations are not followed, property owners, inspection companies, service companies, maintenance companies, or even manufacturers may be found liable for an accident.
Have You Been Injured in a Georgia Accident?
You should be able to trust that, when you step onto an elevator or escalator, the property owner has taken all appropriate steps to maintain the equipment. Unfortunately, if the owner was not diligent about maintenance, serious injuries and even death can occur. When you choose to work with an elevator and escalator injury lawyer from Van Sant Law, you can be confident your attorney will advocate fiercely on your behalf to help you obtain the compensation you deserve. As a top-rated Georgia personal injury law firm, Van Sant Law has experience helping victims of elevator and escalator accidents obtain the damages they are entitled to receive.
Our elevator injury attorneys work out of eight offices across the greater Atlanta metropolitan area. We are committed to providing the best service and we strive to help clients obtain the best possible outcomes in their legal matters. Personal injury claims are time sensitive, so it is important to speak to a knowledgeable elevator injury lawyer as soon as possible. Doing so can help preserve your legal rights and make it easier to obtain the full amount of compensation you deserve.
The aftermath of elevator and escalator accidents can be heart wrenching. Contact a Van Sant Law elevator accident lawyer today if you or someone you care about suffered injuries because of a faulty escalator or elevator in Georgia. We understand the legal landscape for these types of injuries and have years of experience helping clients obtain compensation. Protect your legal rights. Schedule an initial consultation with an elevator injury lawyer today.
Who Is to Blame for Elevator & Escalator Accidents?
In order to collect compensation for an elevator or escalator injury in Georgia, you must prove that another party was at fault for your accident. While investigating your accident, our elevator injury attorneys will ask the following questions:
- Was the escalator or elevator properly maintained, serviced, and inspected?
- If the escalator or elevator was being repaired at the time of the accident, were warning signs present and visible?
- Did the elevator or escalator have a history of malfunctions or accidents?
- Was the elevator or escalator in any way in violation of city safety and building codes?
- Was the owner of the elevator or escalator aware of past problems?
- Should the elevator or escalator accident have been prevented?
Elevator and escalator accidents occur in many forms. Maintenance workers may fall into a shaft, be caught between moving parts, or be struck by elevators or counterweights.
Passengers might fall into the shaft or the elevator they are in may fall. Clothing or body parts may become caught in between moving mechanisms of an elevator or escalator. Alternatively, certain conditions, such as a dangerously wet floor, may contribute to a simple slip and fall accident. In all of these cases, negligence may be a significant factor and a personal injury lawsuit may be appropriate.
