Chisinau man badly injured in elevator mishap

A Chisinau man was badly injured after he fell several flights into the shaft of a broken elevator as he was trying to help a trapped neighbor out. The man opened the elevator doors on the wrong floor and was unable to avoid the fall. According to Ion Stanciu, the head of the municipal enterprise Lift-service, the man is in a very serious, yet stable condition, and is recovering in the intensive care unit of the Emergency Hospital after undergoing surgery. The lift at the apartment house no.68/2 on Albisoara Street has long exceeded its service life, Ion Stanciu reported at today's City Hall meeting. In the same condition are 80 out of 2,120 elevators working in Chisinau's apartment blocks. Mayor Dorin Chirtoaca instructed relevant officials to assess the state of lifts across the city and inform the population of the risks associated with trying to help people out of broken elevators, especially since most of them are old. For 2010 the municipal authorities budgeted 3 million lei for the maintenance of residential lifts.