Boston Warns Against Wheelchair, Escalator Mix
July 18--Escalators and motorized wheelchairs just don't mix, a lesson a woman learned the hard way in South Boston last Friday.
The MBTA yesterday released a video showing the 56-year-old woman being launched backwards and flipping over several times as she attempted to ride her scooter up a moving escalator at Broadway Station on Friday morning.
"It was released to demonstrate the consequences of ignoring the rules pertaining to escalators," MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo said of the transit authority's decision to post security camera footage on YouTube. "Strollers, scooters and wheelchairs are prohibited. An elevator is about fifty feet from this escalator at Broadway Station."
The woman, whom the T did not identify, did not appear to be seriously injured and declined medical attention, Pesaturo said.
The video shows the woman ride up to the base of the escalator behind a tourist and his two sons, reaching out to grab its hand rail with her left hand. She suddenly starts rising upward -- for a few moments. But then disaster strikes and she is shot backward, as if bucked from a bronco.
"The chair flips over, and an alert MBTA bus operator pushed the escalator's emergency stop button," Pesaturo said, noting that other bystanders raced to her aid, including the tourist who ran down the upward moving escalator. "After her tumble, the woman stands up and walks down the escalator."
"Seemingly embarrassed, she said very little to T personnel," he added.
Pesaturo said there were no defects with the elevator.
richard.weir@bostonherald.com
Copyright 2012 - Boston Herald
