Woman, 65, plunges 6 stories to her death in elevator shaft

SAN ANTONIO -- A San Antonio family has questions, after 65-year old Gloria Rodriguez plunged to her death in an elevator shaft at the Crockett Hotel.

“She had a big heart for everybody. It was an accident that could’ve been prevented,” said Jennifer Rodriguez, the victim’s granddaughter.

“They had problems with the elevator before, and unfortunately it wasn’t fixed.”

The family said Rodriguez had just finished her shift as a housekeeper when she entered the service elevator of the historic hotel. The doors may have opened, but the car was nowhere in sight.

Police reports indicate Rodriguez fell several floors to her death.

“This shouldn’t have happened,” said her granddaughter.
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angelmom said:

YIKES! How horrible! Prayers for this poor woman and her family.

I wonder if it was dark. I'm trying to picture an elevator and not noticing that there's no floor. Or she started to move forward as the doors opened and then couldn't stop her momentum once she realized.

It must have been terrifying.

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[Hotel manager William] Brendel said the elevator was regularly maintained and inspected. He told police that the hotel “had been having problems with the elevators,” but they had been serviced and were working properly, according to a San Antonio police report.

The death stunned Rodriguez's family, who described her as a warm, kind-hearted woman. She left behind four children, 10 grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.

“She was always laughing,” said granddaughter Jennifer Rodriguez. “She was always warning the girls about guys: ‘Stay away.'”
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In Texas, licensed inspectors must check elevators annually. The service elevator at the Crockett Hotel was installed in 1981 and its last annual inspection was in December 2010, according to the most recent records on file with the licensing department. Elevator inspector William McPherson did not note any concerns in his report.

In a 2008 inspection report, McPherson wrote that the service elevator needed a door restrictor — a device that prevents elevator doors opening when an elevator is stuck between floors. It prevents occupants from falling out of the elevator down the shaft, and from being injured if the elevator moves while they try to climb out.

Brendel said he couldn't remember if the restrictor had been installed.
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Blondie in Spokane said:

Thanks for posting this story, wfgodot.

From your link:


"Rodriguez's granddaughter said a hotel security guard told the family his theory of how the accident happened: When the elevator doors opened, Rodriguez tried to do what housekeepers usually do — back into the elevator as she pulled her cart of towels and cleaning supplies."

“When you get in the elevator, you have to walk yourself in first,” Jennifer Rodriguez said."

The bolded part makes me weak-kneeded just reading it....what an awful thing to happen. These stories make me so fearful of elevators anymore.

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/lo...gate-Crockett-Hotel-2431280.php#ixzz1hy98NGKV

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All three elevators at the Crockett Hotel, where a housekeeper fell six stories down the shaft of a service elevator Wednesday and was killed, were more than two weeks behind schedule on state-mandated annual inspections.

Elevators at the Menger Hotel, which is owned by the same company, were also behind schedule, said Susan Stanford, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation.
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Stanford said a licensed inspector was supposed to examine elevators at the Crockett by Dec. 14, and elevators at the Menger by Dec. 15. Those inspections hadn't occurred, she said.

All elevators at both hotels were shut down Thursday night and examined by licensed inspectors, Stanford said. The elevators passed the inspections, but the hotels' owner could still be in violation of state regulations for failing to inspect them by the scheduled deadline, she said.
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Rodriguez's daughter, Sara Ochoa, works at the Menger Hotel and said the service elevator at the Crockett had gotten stuck in the past. In a tearful interview Thursday, she said the hotel didn't do enough to keep its employees safe.

“There's no need for my mother to fall six floors down,” Ochoa said.

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angelmom said:

YIKES! How horrible! Prayers for this poor woman and her family.

I wonder if it was dark. I'm trying to picture an elevator and not noticing that there's no floor. Or she started to move forward as the doors opened and then couldn't stop her momentum once she realized.

It must have been terrifying.

Click to expand...

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“Based upon current information, it is believed that she attempted to get on the elevator but when the doors opened there was no elevator, causing her to fall,” Houston-based attorney James Hada wrote in the suit, filed Wednesday.

The suit, on behalf of Rodriguez's four grown children, seeks unspecified damages for her pain and suffering as well as for their loss of companionship, mental anguish and loss of inheritance.
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The lawsuit is intended, in part, to preserve the evidence until it is determined whether either company [Otis Elevator Co. or Historic Hotels Ltd.] was negligent, said Hada, the family's attorney. The court filings seek a temporary injunction barring the companies from tampering with or destroying elevator parts until an investigation can be completed.
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