Doctor decapitated by lift in hospital accident as colleague watched in horror

A colleague was forced to watch on in horror when a doctor was decapitated by a lift in a gruesome hospital accident.

Hitoshi Nikaidoh, 35, was stepping into a second-floor elevator at Christus St. Joseph Hospital, in Houston, Texas, the US, when the doors closed suddenly, and pinned his shoulders. His head was severed when the lift moved upward.

A hospital employee witnessed the horrific ordeal and spent about 20 minutes trapped inside the lift with the surgical resident's body before firefighters could rescue her. According to hospital spokesman India Chumney Hancock, the woman who witnessed the horrifying tragedy was treated in the hospital's emergency room.

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Harris County medical examiners carried out an inquiry into the incident and police said maintenance crews had worked on the lift earlier in the week. The entire bank of elevators ceased operation while the investigation was conducted.

Dr. Niakaidoh was born in Japan and moved with his family to Connecticut as a child. He graduated from the University of Texas-Houston Medical School in June 2003, following in his father's footsteps into the field of surgery.

The investigation found a single extra wire was the cause of the accident in elevator 14 where Dr Nikaidoh was killed.

If the configuration of the lift had been correct, only one wire and not two would have been connected to one of the many controller studs in the elevator control system. The empty space would have enabled the sensors to function properly and the victim would have been released with no harm inflicted.

While the misplaced wire was ruled as the predominant cause of Nikaidoh’s death, alarmingly, it turned out to be only one of several examples of negligent maintenance work on Elevator 14.

During the course of his investigation into the lift, Chief Elevator Inspector Ron Steele of the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation uncovered no fewer than 22 code violations. The lift was also a month overdue for its annual inspection.

Fire House reported elevators and escalators kill about 30 and injure about 17,100 people each year in the United States, according to data provided by the U.S. Bureau of Labour Statistics and the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

Historical records credit the first elevator being constructed by the ancient Greek engineer and inventor Archimedes. It is believed he created a crude design utilizing hemp rope and manual power in the year 236 B.C.

Since then, the design and technology has evolved and while elevators are seen today as a relatively safe mode of transport, issues still sometimes arise.

According to Crieff Law Firm, only one in 12 million elevator rides is estimated to encounter a problem. And even then, the majority of those problems tend to be issues like sticking doors and forgetful buttons.

The law firm stated that statistically speaking, you are far more likely to be injured or killed by a slip and fall accident on a set of stairs than by a ride in an elevator.