|
Monday March 20, 2017
Deny Elevator Petition as ASME Addressed Worries, Say CPSCersCommissioners are slated to vote by March 21 on a CPSC staff recommendation to deny a 2014 petition on residential elevators. The reason for staff's position is updates to the voluntary standard run by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME). The briefing package (bit.ly/2n2VUKz) asserts, "ASME A17.1-2016, Safety Code for Elevators and Escalators, addresses the potential hazard of child entrapment."
The authors highlighted three updates: a 4-inch limit between cars and hoistway doors, a test method addressing all points on accordion doors, and provisions on elevator door rigidity. They deemed high compliance likely "if staff works with the ASME 17.1 committee to alert state regulatory bodies of the new requirements in the voluntary standard."
The petitioners asserted (PSL, 1/19/15) there were some 1,600 incidents in 2011 and 2012, including entrapments with injuries and deaths. However, the new staff analysis noted, "The petitioners only provide details on 16 incidents that occurred between 1958 and 2013, in which a child was purported to have been injured or killed while entrapped in the subject space in a residential elevator. However, a review by CPSC staff…indicates that at least 13 of the 16 incidents did not involve residential elevators or were not related to the entrapment hazard identified by the petitioners; and the cause could not be determined in some incidents." |