Originally Posted by
Uplinker
In our wonderful country they probably had nobody on duty at the airport who knew how to operate the lifts, or wasn't allowed to because of insurance and safety. So they probably had to call out the manufacturer or whoever held the maintenance contract from home miles and miles away to drive in to release the people.
I can't speak for Birmingham but both Heathrow and Gatwick have a full shift of lift and escalator engineers on site 24/7. They have a matter of minutes to attend any trapping incident as per their contract.
The matter of releasing the occupants depends on the mode of failure. The vast majority merely require an electrical reset or moving the car to the nearest landing which can be achieved quickly, usually within a few minutes of arrival on site.
Occasionally the rescue takes longer and I know of one case where the fire brigade had to be tasked to build a ladder train several storeys down the shaft. Entry was effected to the car by cutting a hole in the roof. All this takes time to achieve in a manner which ensures the continuous safety of both those within the car and the personnel undertaking the rescue.
It takes as long as it takes to assess the situation, correctly determine the failure mode and formulate an effecient and safe form of rescue which prevents further distress to the car occupants. They may be elderly, infirm or children and not fluent in the local language. You really do not want to get it wrong.