‘Like playing Russian roulette.’ Plunging elevators scare, hurt people at Florida hospital

Malfunctioning elevators that suddenly dropped several floors have injured at least 12 people at Miami’s veterans hospital over two years, according to a nurses union.

The Miami VA Medical Center “is supposed to be a place of healing. It is not supposed to have death trap elevators,” Bill Frogameni, a registered nurse who works at the veteran’s hospital and is the director of National Nurses United Miami VA chapter, told the Miami Herald in a phone interview. National Nurses United represents thousands of nurses at 23 VA facilities.

Patients and workers use the elevators to move through the 12-story hospital at 1201 NW 16th St in Miami. And all of the Miami VA’s main hospital elevators were listed as having some parts in poor or critical condition during the hospital’s most recent 2023 assessment, which the Miami Herald obtained through a federal public record request.

While the VA told the union that all of the deficiencies were addressed, some hospital employees say they are concerned about the safety of patients and employees.

Several employees have reported dropping several floors while inside an elevator over the past several years, with at least one worker suffering a “career-ending” injury that required back surgery, according to Frogameni and Eurys Gamez, a registered nurse who works in the hospitals’ psychiatric unit and is the union’s safety officer.

Another employee told the Herald that an elevator that suddenly dropped several floors resulted in an ankle injury.

The most recent injury employees are aware of happened in late 2024, but the union says the issue has persisted for years.

A veteran who has worked at the hospital for more than five years as a health tech had a scare inside one of the hospital’s elevators about two years ago.

The employee and another colleague had just taken a patient to one of the upper medical floors. While attempting to go back down to the ER with the empty stretcher, the elevator abruptly stopped. Then it dropped about eight floors “like a free fall” before it got stuck and began to bounce, said the employee, who asked not to be named to protect employment. The elevator eventually stopped on the first floor.

VA management officials in a recent meeting said they’re working to address the safety concerns and have instructed several companies delivering items to not put pallet jacks in some elevators that can only handle a certain weight, according to Jeffrey Jones, president of the Miami VA’s local chapter of the American Federation of Government Employees, a union that represents thousands of federal workers across the nation, including more than 1,000 at the Miami VA.

Both Frogameni and Jones say their unions plan to monitor the situation to make sure that the problem is solved for patients, visitors and workers.

“This is a safety topic that needs to be tackled immediately,” Jones said.

Malfunctioning elevators are just one of many problems at the aging Miami VA, which was built in 1967 and also has struggled for years with air-conditioning problems and roof leaks, according to employees.

The Miami VA has spent thousands on an aging HVAC system that in 2023 had a meltdown during South Florida’s hottest summer and forced the hospital to temporarily stall elective surgeries and displace some patients from their rooms. The VA estimates work to install new chillers and replace or repair more than a dozen air handler units in the hospital’s buildings will be completed by 2027.

“This entire building has a lot of issues — electrical, plumbing-wise, roofing, leaking roofs — we have all types of issues in the building. But we’re focusing now on the most critical part, where people are getting injured in elevators,” said Gamez, who was briefly trapped inside an elevator about two years ago.

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The Miami VA, in an emailed statement to the Miami Herald, said all of its elevators were “in working order” but didn’t answer questions about injuries or incidents of people getting trapped inside elevators.

“When elevator issues arise, the Miami VA Medical Center works to address them immediately,” VA spokesperson Mary Kay Rutan said in an email when asked about the malfunctioning elevators. All the hospital elevators “are in working order and compliance with current elevator safety standards.”

The veterans hospital told Miami Herald partner CBS News Miami last month that its building service staff “regularly conducts inspections and maintenance to ensure compliance with all safety and regulatory standards.”

Hospital employees the Herald spoke with said they are skeptical that the elevators were fixed and say it’s common to hear about a colleague who got stuck in an elevator or plunged several floors.

“Every time I step into an elevator, it’s like playing Russian roulette,” Gamez said. “Is it gonna take me where I need to go or is it gonna drop on me and I’m gonna get hurt?”