Cambridge Elevating Elevator Recalls: What the CPSC Records Show

What the CPSC Recall Records Say About Cambridge Elevating

The CPSC recall notices naming Cambridge Elevating include these:

• Recall 22-234, dated September 29, 2022: Cambridge Elevating Residential Elevators Recalled Due to Child Entrapment Hazard; Risk of Serious Injury or Death to Young Children.
• Recall 19-091, dated March 27, 2019: Cambridge Elevating Recalls Home Elevators Due to Fall Hazard.
• Recall 15-102, dated March 19, 2015: Child's Catastrophic Brain Injury Prompts Recall of Residential Elevators.

Each notice names a hazard, identifies the elevators involved and describes a remedy. The sections below take each notice in turn, then explain what a recall does and does not decide, who may be responsible after an injury, and which records tend to matter.

Who Made, Sold and Serviced the Recalled Elevators

The CPSC recall pages identify Cambridge Elevating as the manufacturer. The 2022 notice lists "Cambridge Elevating Inc., of Canada." The 2019 notice lists "Cambridge Elevating, of Cambridge, Ontario Canada." All three notices state that the elevators were manufactured in Canada.

These are residential elevators: home elevators installed in a private residence, as opposed to the commercial elevators in hotels, offices, malls and hospitals that most pages on this site cover.

For a family, the practical point is that the company that built an elevator is often not the only business that touched it. The notices name dealers, importers and a distributor, and the 2019 remedy refers consumers to "a local certified technician." Installation and maintenance are often handled by separate contractors. That means questions about responsibility after an injury can involve more than one business, and the paperwork from each of them may matter. The same layered roles appear on pages about TK Elevator and Otis Elevator Company.

Nothing in these records, and nothing on this page, states or implies that Cambridge Elevating caused any injury, was negligent or broke any law.

The 2022 Recall: Child Entrapment Hazard

CPSC recall 22-234 was announced on September 29, 2022. It concerns an entrapment hazard, meaning a person becomes caught or trapped in or between parts of an elevator in a way that keeps them from moving freely.

The CPSC page states the hazard this way: "Young children can become entrapped in the space between the exterior landing (hoistway) door and the interior elevator car door or gate if there is a hazardous gap and suffer serious injuries or death when the elevator is called to another floor." The notice explains that the exterior door can lock a child into that space when the elevator is called away, "putting the child at risk of being crushed or pinned."

The recall covers Cambridge Elevating residential elevator models Elmira and Heritage, with the brand name on the controller. It lists about 1,700 units, sold by "Cambridge Elevating and authorized residential elevator dealers nationwide from 1991 through August 2022."

The remedy is a repair. In the notice's words, consumers should "keep unsupervised young children away from the recalled residential elevators and contact Cambridge Elevating Inc. for instructions on how to measure for space guards to correct any hazardous gap." The page says space guards "will be provided free of charge," and lists the company's consumer contact information.

Under "Incidents/Injuries," the page states: "None reported." For a household with this model, a useful question is whether space guards were ever measured for and installed, since that record shows whether the remedy was carried out.

The 2019 Recall: Fall Hazard

CPSC recall 19-091 is dated March 27, 2019. The CPSC page identifies the hazard in one sentence: "The landing door on the elevators can unlock without the elevator present, posing a fall hazard." The landing door is the door on each floor that opens onto the elevator shaft.

The recall involves Elmira, Heritage & Hybrid model home elevators "using the first and second generation micro-controller systems (BES 1 & BES 2)." It is limited to elevators with production date codes from 1/2/2009 through 29/11/17 on the manufacture label inside the elevator wall. The page lists about 680 units, and notes that about 1,700 more were sold in Canada. It names importers in South Carolina and New York, and says the elevators were sold through Cambridge Elevating and authorized dealers from January 2009 through November 2017.

The remedy stated is a repair: consumers "should immediately stop using the recalled elevators and contact the firm to be directed to a local certified technician for a free repair."

On incidents, the page states: "The firm has received one report of the elevator landing door opening without the elevator present. No injuries have been reported." Because this recall turns on a date code printed inside the elevator wall, a photograph of that label can be the difference between knowing an elevator was covered and guessing.

The 2015 Recall: What the CPSC Record States

CPSC recall 15-102 is dated March 19, 2015. Its title is "Child's Catastrophic Brain Injury Prompts Recall of Residential Elevators." For a parent reading this, that title is hard to take in. Here is exactly what the page records.

The product is listed as "Residential hydraulic elevators," specifically "Elmira Hydraulic residential hydraulic elevators" with a manual accordion-style car gate door. The page states that "Cambridge Elevating" is printed on the push button panel. The hazard: "The elevator can operate while the gate door is open, posing a crushing hazard." The notice lists about 240 units.

This notice is narrower than the other two. It states that the elevators were sold by Coastal Carolina Elevators "through residential contractors and home builders" in South Carolina, from January 2006 through December 2009. It names Cambridge Elevating, of Canada, as manufacturer, and Coastal Carolina Elevators LLC, formerly Seaside Elevator LLC, as distributor. The remedy is a repair through Coastal Carolina Elevator.

On incidents, the page states that "Coastal Carolina Elevators has received three reports of incidents with the elevators, including one injury that resulted in a catastrophic brain injury to a 10-year-old boy from Baltimore, Md."

That is what the CPSC page records. It does not settle what caused that injury, and one recall covering one group of elevators is not evidence of a defect across the brand or its products.

What a CPSC Recall Does and Does Not Decide

A recall is an official safety action in which the CPSC and a company announce that a product poses a hazard and describe a remedy. The remedy can be a repair, a replacement or a refund. Every notice on this page lists "Repair."

A recall is not a court judgment. It is not a finding of negligence, and it is not a determination that a product caused anyone's injury. It also stands apart from three other kinds of records:

• An incident report is an account of something that happened, including reports a firm receives and reports consumers submit to the CPSC, such as through its public database at saferproducts.gov. It is a submission, not an agency finding about cause.
• A lawsuit is a legal claim one party brings against another. Filing one is not a finding that anyone is liable.
• A court finding of liability is a decision, after the case is heard, that a party is legally responsible.

None of these records proves the others. If someone in your home was hurt, a recall notice may show that a hazard was identified for certain elevators. Whether it bears on what happened depends on whether that elevator was covered and whether the hazard described had anything to do with the injury. A conversation with an attorney can help sort out what these records may mean in a particular situation.

Who May Be Responsible When a Home Elevator Injures Someone

Two legal theories usually come up when a residential elevator injures someone.

Product liability is a theory under which a person hurt by a product may seek to hold the manufacturer, a seller or others in the distribution chain responsible for a defect that caused the injury. It generally asks two things: was there a defect in the product, and did that defect cause the injury?

Premises liability is a theory under which a person hurt on someone else's property may seek to hold the owner or occupier responsible for a hazardous condition there. It generally asks whether a duty was owed to the injured person, whether that duty was breached, whether the breach caused the injury, and what damages resulted. In a private home, that can raise questions about the homeowner, a landlord, or whoever controlled the property.

In plain terms, a family may be looking at the businesses behind the elevator, the people responsible for the home, or both. An injury does not prove anyone was at fault, and a recall record does not prove either set of elements on its own.

The rules also change with the state. Limitation periods are the time within which a claim must be filed. Those periods, along with fault rules and damages rules, differ from state to state, and the law of the state where the injury happened usually governs. The concrete consequence is that a filing period can run out regardless of how strong the facts are, so the first question worth asking is which state's law applies. The site's elevator accident lawyer page covers that framework in more depth.

Records That Help Show What Happened in a Home Elevator Injury

If you were hurt, or your child was, a few kinds of records tend to shape every later question:

• The CPSC recall notices themselves, as official records of an identified hazard, the models covered and the remedy offered.
• Medical records documenting the injury and treatment.
• Photographs or video of the elevator, its doors and gate, its labels and the scene.
• The elevator's installation and maintenance records, including any recall repair or space-guard installation.
• Any incident report made to a property owner, a property manager, the company or the CPSC.
• The names of anyone who saw what happened.

Labels matter because the notices tie each recall to specific identifiers: production date codes and controller generations in 2019, the brand name on the controller in 2022, and the push button panel in 2015. If an elevator is later repaired or replaced, those labels and the scene as it was can be lost.

Inspection and maintenance records show the elevator's service history; they do not show fault by themselves. For families unsure which of these records bear on what happened, a case evaluation with our attorney is one place to talk that through.

Questions Families Weigh Before Deciding on Next Steps

After a residential elevator injury, the decision is usually whether to pursue a claim, and against whom. That tends to rest on a handful of questions:

• Was the elevator covered by a CPSC recall, and if so, which one? The model, controller and production dates on the labels answer that.
• Who manufactured, installed and maintained it?
• What was the injury, and how did it happen? Did it involve the door gap, the landing door or the gate described in a notice, or something else?
• Which state's law applies?

The answers shape which theories may apply and who may be responsible. A case evaluation is a conversation with our attorney about the elevator, the home, the injuries and the records the family has. For background on how often these accidents occur, see the site's page on elevator accident statistics.