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With all due sympathy to the woman and her child, some of the responses on this thread make me think a lot of Americans should be wearing helmets if they are allowed outside unaccompanied.
People need to be aware of their surroundings and take some responsibility for their own safety. Look both ways when crossing the street, look into an elevator before entering, drive defensively, don't stab your face with your fork when eating, when putting on shoes, toes go in first.
Take some responsibility for your own basic safety. Society cannot control every eventuality.
Haha good points.
I for one am not blaming the victim as some here claim some people are, and it doesn't seem you are either. There is nothing wrong with questioning HOW this happened on the mother's end as well. It doesn't mean anybody is blaming her, just wondering HOW she didn't realize the elevator wasn't there.
The vehement reaction against people who question the victim's conduct in accidents like this confuses me. It doesn't take away from the negligence on the other side at all to question how someone manages to do something like this. I just feel like most people would look at and into the elevator before stepping in, and I also don't think the excuse that the stroller may have been too big to see over holds much weight.
When the woman in Westchester County NY drove right though the MetroNorth railroad barrier a few years ago on the street and got hit by a train, people rightfully questioned her conduct as well. How do you not see the oncoming train and barriers down? How do you not see there's no elevator there? They are valid questions.
People aren't taught the dangers of elevators and people take them for granted. All machinery can malfunction and when we are able to operate that machinery, we should be required to learn the safety involved.
Also, this woman couldn't have pushed a stroller "into someone's shins" because there was no elevator when the doors opened up.
Again with people being too literal. He didn't mean THIS woman pushing a stroller into shins, rather the idea that anyone would not look to see where the stroller was going. Most people tend to look before stepping into an elevator in order not to run into other people that might already be there, in any elevator.
The elevator doors should not have opened if the elevator wasn't there.
There should have been signs saying "out of order" and such.
But... there is NO way a person who is paying any amount of attention at all would not immediately notice the difference between an elevator car and an empty shaft.
It's horrible that a baby had to die because of a horrible chain of bad decisions - or lack of any thought whatsoever.
Again with people being too literal. He didn't mean THIS woman pushing a stroller into shins, rather the idea that anyone would not look to see where the stroller was going. Most people tend to look before stepping into an elevator in order not to run into other people that might already be there, in any elevator.
This is good advice.
I've seen people on a cell phone step off a curb oblivious and a car runs a red light.
You do that and get badly mangled and maybe it's a coca cola truck that hits you and they pay you a lot while it takes you 2 years to sorta recover.
Then again, maybe it's an uninsured driver and there is NO MONEY (or very little) and it could destroy your life as you know it.
Zero difference in the persons behavior, it's not their fault, but damn are they screwed.
The elevator doors should not have opened if the elevator wasn't there.
There should have been signs saying "out of order" and such.
But... there is NO way a person who is paying any amount of attention at all would not immediately notice the difference between an elevator car and an empty shaft.
It's horrible that a baby had to die because of a horrible chain of bad decisions - or lack of any thought whatsoever.
We really don't know the persons situation nor the full story.
If you've never had a brain fart or been loopy from a lack of sleep or whatever helped cause this then good for you....but crap happens.
I remember a squad of soldiers that got effed up because in the heat of the moment a guy put THEIR coordinates into the bombing request instead of the enemy. Stuff happens.
This was awful. Poor baby And this poor mom. I know what it's like to wake up in the morning & think "Why didn't you just take me too? Why am I still here?'
Wouldn't wish that on my worst enenmy.
I've been trying to imagine how this could happen; given the details that are known. I'm a "multiple multiples" mom; twins ... twice. I've navigated just about every terrain with any kind of stroller you can imagine. Double front-back, double side by side; double jogging, single jogging, umbrella-style. Elevators, double doors, curbs. Even stairs.
At one point I had 4 babies under age 2; I've done it all. And it just occured to me:
What if she wasn't WAITING for the elevator ...What if she was RUSHING to the elevator?
You know; your rounding a corner in a hallway & hear that "Bing-Bong"; signaling that the elevator door is opening.
Your trying not to miss it. Trying to round that corner knowing that if the front wheels cross the door threshold that the doors will rebound & let you in ...
The weight distribution in some strollers is kind of odd. ESPECIALLY in a common stroller that a 6 week old would be in; the kind where the seat is actually the car seat that "clicks" into both a stroller base & the base of a car seat.
If the front wheels crossed the threshold into "thin-air" the weight of that stroller would make it immpossible to recover it: It will tip forward & pull whoever is holding the handle right with it.
The mom & baby would be actually "pulled-in" BEFORE the mom had a chance to see that the elevator car was not there.
...Which sounds awful. But in that case; I can see this being possible.
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