Boston University professor crushed to death in elevator crash

A Boston University professor was crushed by an elevator in her apartment building when she suddenly fell, trapping her between floors.

French teacher Carrie O’Connor, 38, was riding the elevator with a box on the first floor of the building in Allston around 5.15 p.m. local time Monday when the elevator shook down, residents said.

“I heard someone bringing a package in the hall, and then I heard an unholy cry,” resident Leanne Scorzoni told local television station WCVB.

“Then we ran out into the hall and saw a gentleman who was obviously distraught. He was screaming and hyperventilating, saying, ‘She’s dead! She’s dead!'”

O’Connor had just moved into the Commonwealth Ave building a few weeks ago.

A man who witnessed the accident had to be taken to hospital for trauma. A source told The Sun, “He saw things that no one should see.”

Scorzoni told CBS that the man “was helping [O’Connor] With a box in the building, and he was coming up the stairs, and he had said, “Hey, be careful, because … you have to pull the door and then go in and then push the button.”

He said the elevator was “out of date.”

“If you have something in there, you can trigger a sensor.

“[The witness] believe whatever [O’Connor] it was trying to get in there, it hit the sensor, and then it started moving. “

The roof of the elevator car was visible from the lobby after the incident, residents said.

“The car had to have gone down at least half,” Scorzoni said.

An autopsy showed O’Connor died of “traumatic asphyxia.”

The Massachusetts agency responsible for overseeing elevator safety said the elevator passed inspection at the 1920 building last year, according to local NBC station. It was unclear how old the elevator was.