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Carnage On The Escalators

carole said:
Oops, I've just fallen off me soap box!
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Sue the soap-box makers! A clear case of shoddy goods, I'd say, unsuited to its purpose...
 
I remember that there was a paternoster lift at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow in the 1970's. Dunno if it's still working, but if you were fit & wanted a laugh you would go up to the top & do a hand stand on the way down!!1

It gave the kids a laugh, but seemed to scare the hell out of their parents.

I suppose you can't please everyone can you?:D
 
Have never ridden a paternoster lift in my life; but this thread however does remind me somewhat of the character Brodie Bruce, as played by the scrummy Jason Lee, in the film "Mallrats".
 
You've never lived Outlaw Angel.:(

Seriously though, they were great fun & a lot quicker than waiting for the lift all the time.:D
 
My mother is VERY afraid of escalators, when ever we went on on, she made sure our shoelaces were tied before hand, and made us hold her hand and the rail. She was always white as ghost while riding it, and it took alot of coxing from me and my sister to tell us why. She said that when she was younger she saw a women fall down one ( I don't know if it was due to getting something stuck in it, but I don't think so) and was bleeding very badly. The other day my skirt got stuck on an escalator and at first I was frantic, remembering my mom's story, but a few tugs got it out.:) I got my arm stuck in a conveior belt at a groccery store once, the sensors were not working, and I reached over to get something off of it and it pinched the tiniest bit of skin! It hurt so bad! the had to reverse it to get my arm out! I am scared to lay my arm across on to this day!
 
Being moderately afraid of heights, I always find those HUGE escalators on the London Underground pretty daunting. Not so bad going up, but coming down . . . :eek!!!!:

And have any of you ever tried going down a shop escalator with two 3 year old children and a load of shopping?:eek!!!!: :eek!!!!:

Carole
 
I have a friend who got his hand caught in an escalator when he was very young,about 2 or 3 years old.Fortunatly his mum hit the emergency stop button very quickly.He still bears the scars to this day though.Munched it up pretty good.
 
Wow, I'm totally amazed by this. The few escalators I've been around <supposedly> have had safety shut-off devices for whenever stuff gets stuck in there. I've never seen or heard about anyone ever having trouble. Incredible. Perhaps I shall experiment with a doll of my own...
 
Well, the escalator accidents obviously do happen.
London Underground are running a big safety campaign at the moment warning people to be careful of long, flowing clothing and to always hold the handrail. They quote staistics of several hundred people injured, and one person killed on the escalators last year. Which, considering the tens of thousands of people who use London Underground every day, is a pretty small risk.
 
Being a London born girl I went on those BIG underground escalators many times and the steep incline always made me feel as if I was leaning backwards even when I was not. Very strange feeling.The sound of them creaking and that odd smell of rubber and oil, brrrrrrrr.

Also,I remember that public information film warning of death by drowning with the grubby grim reaper figure- that has haunted my thoughts for many years. Do kids still get public information films? Are they made anymore? The last ones I can remember are the AIDS ones back in the 80's............
 
There is a big escalator at the Hatfield Galleria, that used to have the same efect on people Blueswidow.

The first time I went down it, I could see people infront of me suddenly grab at the hand rail. Then I got to the same point where the escalator entered an atrum space & I was doing the same.

The effect was as if you were decending into a vast void with only a slender escalator as support. A very strange feeling, but a few months later the company that owned the place, fitted baffles hanging from the ceiling & this stopped the illusion.
 
liveinabin said:
I grew up in the country and the police came round to my primary school and showed us this truely scarey film af 7 children dieing on farms. Including drowning slurry.

All that when you're 6. And all live on or near farms. Fantasic we didn't sleep for weeks.
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We got a video on the perils of playing on a building site, I remember a fair few of my classmates turning a lovely shade of green. We also used to get a bloke from British Rail talking about hitting things on the lines.
 
Drilling madness

I'm not so sure about escalators, but i'm sure every school around the country has a drill story.

You know where friendly woodwork teacher says to you "now kids this drill is very dangerous, once upon a time at this very school, little Timmy didnt tuck in his tie and it wound round the drill and strangled him, so you must always wear proper safety equipment. I hope i haven't disturbed you in any way... now go and play with those big saws..."

Or maybe that was just our school.... :eek!!!!:
 
more public info films

I remember being shown the one about not going on railway lines at school. It was about a boy who loved football and then got his feet chopped off by a train. at the end of the film it goes "and he still kept his football boots....no one knows why" and there's a shot of his bedroom door closing with the boots hanging by their laces on a hook.

Remember hearing about a cub scout troop (in canada?) who all got mangled in an escalator but must have been an urban myth.
 
I remember in our woodwork class. Besides this big drill there was an articler hanged up with a picture. It was of a girl who had got her long hair caught in a machine. And half of it had been ripped out. Bit it was in the metal department, I don't think any children came in and saw the pic.
 
I can remember the picture of the "scalped" girl in the 1960's & vaguely remember a radio interview with &/or about her.

The story we got at school, was of the kid who wore a ring & put his hand on a lathe chuck, the ring caught & ripped his finger off!!!!
 
Sailors, in sailing ship days, wouldn't wear rings in case they got caught up in the various ropes, which can move at high speed if things get out of control. So even if your finger wasn't ripped off, it might end up trapped and crushed in a (pulley) block.

Although paradoxically they were often fond of ear rings, which once signified a sailor who had rounded the Horn.
 
Wasn't there a goalie who jumped up to catch a ball and caught his ring on a net hook and came down to Earth minus a finger ?
Just a couple of weeks ago there was an escalator story in a local paper , this is an outdoor escalator in Yeovil . Apparently it was going unusually fast . An elderly couple tried to use it - the woman lost her balance and fell back onto a man behind her , they fell to the bottom and because of the speed , every time they tried to get up they were flipped down again by the moving steps and bumped about . They were covered in bruises . Someone eventually managed to stop it .
Marion
 
I know that escalator. I was always worried about using it, what with it being outside and Glovers walk (where the escalator comes from) always smelling of wee.
Good record shop at the bottom though.

I think all those public information films are available to buy on video.
I remember one about badly laid carpets!
 
Marion, your story of the goalie, sounds quite possiblie.

Somthing a bit like it, is the story of the cat burgalar who jumped over a spiked wall. His ring caught on a spike & the finger came off!!!! :eek!!!!:

From memory, it is, recorded in a book, 'Mostly Murder' by Sydney Smith the pathologist.
 
Balls

Marion said:
Wasn't there a goalie who jumped up to catch a ball and caught his ring on a net hook and came down to Earth minus a finger ?
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This reminds me of a FOAF tale I heard as a kid. Someone was climbing on a goal post, slipped and fell, and unfortunately, to use a footballing phrase, slit his ball bag.

BTW Happy New Year everyone.
 
About escalator accidents, they do seem to happen quite often. On dec. 13, 1999, an eight-year-old girl was crushed to death in an escalator accident at the Indira Gandhi International Airport.

More horror stories here, here, here, here and here.
 
Does anyone remember the Public Info film,
"I am the spirit of dark and lonely waters......." designed to put kids off going anywhere near open stretches of water? Put me off going anywhere!!

As for the Charlie adverts, they were brilliant. We had a Charlie at our school and he used to do a brilliant impression of said cat.
 
I vaguely remember the very spooky 'dark and lonely waters' PI fillum.
I wonder if it was pulled for being too scary, or too supernatural and therefore not 'commonsense' enough?
 
After being dim earlier in this thread and not knowing what a paternoster lift was; I actually went into a building in Prague that had one. But after the conversations we had I was far to afraid to use it!
 
1. I knew a girl who was quite famous who raced pushbikes for the county. She took a tumble at high speed and when her hand reflexively went out to save herself her ring finger gotcaught in the spokes and sliced it clean off. This was in the early days of microsurgery, and they stitched it back on for cosmetic reasons as it was her left hand ring finger, but she couldn't bend it or anything, although it looked fairly OK.

2. We have a paternoster at work and once you get used to them they're great - only two per car, but they save so much queueing at 9.00am. Ours has a notice saying "Warning: leave car at next floor - further travel not dangerous". Strange wording, I always think, but I suppose it means you won't be killed or anything if you stay on.

I've been underneath in it (accidently), and it's spooky cos it's the only time you can't see out, but I've never been over the top. I think it's probably an old wives' tale that they squash flat or turn upside down - they just lurch from one cable on to the other one and you have to stand perfectly still else it goes out of alignment and stops the whole chain (about 30 cars in our case) and you have to wait till Security come and get you out. Then they shout at you and make a show of you, because staff are supposed to set a good example to the students.

Neither experience is very pleasant - being shouted at or being trapped for up to half an hour in a dark box 6 feet square. I think they're switched off at about 5.30pm for safety reasons - imagine being stuck in there overnight!!
 
What in god's name is a paternoster? What was that last post about? Is it me? :(
 
LOL - yes, I'm afraid it is you, Beak!

DanHigginbottom said:
Dunno about escalators, but any of the (mysteriously numerous) Sheffield posters hereabouts will surely know of the Patenoster at Sheffield University. It's a kind of endlessly moving open lift, lacking doors - a series of platforms moving constantly up and down the ginormous (for Sheffield) Arts tower.

Stories are rife of students who got their flapping jumper sleeves caught as it reached the top, were flipped over and jettisoned down the shaft. Either that, or they fell asleep in a drunken stupor.

(LEGAL WARNING - *it isn't true*).
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carole said:
One thing I found really scary was the paternoster lift we had at our university when I was a student. Especially the bit where it used to go round at the top or bottom and it was pitch black. There were plenty of horror stories told about it . . .

Carole
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liveinabin said:
Ok

I might be being a bit dim but what is a paternoster lift?

Is it the ones that are open and keep moving, you just jump on and off o the floor you want?
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David said:
I remember that there was a paternoster lift at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow in the 1970's. Dunno if it's still working, but if you were fit & wanted a laugh you would go up to the top & do a hand stand on the way down!!1

It gave the kids a laugh, but seemed to scare the hell out of their parents.

I suppose you can't please everyone can you?:D
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Sorry, not being sarky - I had to include David's post because I thought it was so funny!
 
OK so I didn't read the whole thread. it was late, what can I say.:)
 
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