Power outage traps woman at BMH
A woman was trapped in an elevator Monday evening at Butler Memorial Hospital during a brief power outage.
Butler Fire Department responded around 5 p.m. to a call of a power outage at the hospital and a woman trapped in an elevator between the sixth and seventh floors of the hospital’s Tower wing.
“Backup generators came on and the other elevators came on with it,” said fire Capt. Tom Fair. “Everything worked the way it was supposed to, but that one elevator didn’t come back on.”
The woman — an apparent visitor, Fair said — was in the elevator for 15 to 20 minutes before firefighters managed to free her.
A spokesman for FirstEnergy, parent company of West Penn Power, said an equipment failure interrupted electrical service to about 20 customers in Butler’s northeast quadrant, including the hospital.
West Penn Power workers arrived shortly after the outage was reported. Full service was restored by 7:20 p.m.
