In the country, more than 78 thousand elevators will need to be replaced in a year.
At the same time, today the load of Russian elevator plants is incomplete – most of the enterprises operate at half their capacity.
The Ministry of Industry and Trade stated: “The capacities of Russian factories allow for the production of more than 60 thousand elevators per year, which can fully meet the need of capital repair funds for new equipment.” So why do we ride broken-down elevators that either just fall down or start “attacking” people by jamming their doors? Apparently, our officials are simply unable to properly use the existing opportunities.
But some evil tongues go even further: many openly say that these problems are caused by the fact that the management companies collecting money for major repairs – from which the renovation of the elevator facilities should be paid – simply stole this money. Another bell about the need for a radical reform of our housing and communal services system.
One way or another, but today more than 78 thousand elevators in Russia are operating with an expiring shelf life – they are more than 25 years old. Such data were announced recently at a meeting of the Public Council under the Ministry of Housing and Communal Services of the Russian Federation. According to the requirements of the technical regulations of the Customs Union, elevators that have served for 25 years must be replaced by February 15, 2025, that is, for this year. After that, they will not be able to be exploited.
As you know, until recently, elevators that were mostly “alien” to us were installed in Russia. Of course, there are not enough spare parts after the imposition of sanctions. And an attempt to replace the missing parts of an Italian elevator with Turkish or Chinese spare parts sometimes leads to unpredictable consequences. As a result, it was not possible to raise money to replace 45 thousand elevators in Russia.
IN THE ELEVATOR UPSIDE DOWN
Elevator accidents are happening more and more often. The other day, three adults and one child were injured when an elevator fell in the village of Shushary in St. Petersburg. They were taken to the hospital with bruises. At the end of January in the Northern capital, a student got stuck in an elevator, which began to fill with water from a torn pipe. The incident occurred in the residential complex “Etalon on Neva”. The student’s phone was not working, and communication with the outside world was only through the dispatcher button. The girl could not be rescued from the elevator filled with water for about an hour. She almost died from drowning!
In Moscow, on February 1, a 17-year-old girl was climbing to the ninth floor in an elevator, but the cabin suddenly began to fall and stop between floors. At the moment when the elevator was in the mine, the teenager managed to contact his mother. The Russian woman called the dispatcher, and the young girl was saved. Again, in the capital, the elevator collapsed on an employee of the elevator company, who was just repairing it: the man was hospitalized with numerous injuries.
And in Nizhny Tagil, a young woman with a small child in a stroller found herself in a faulty elevator. The lift got stuck between the first and second floors, and the stroller, which was inside the cabin, turned over. The victim was trapped and hung upside down. Neighbors ran out to the woman’s heart-rending screams and held her up for half an hour before rescuers arrived, otherwise she would have had a brain hemorrhage: a person physically cannot stay upside down for a long time. The child was saved from falling into the elevator shaft by the fact that he was strapped in, and the stroller was stuck, buried in the woman’s body. As a result of the elevator incident, a young woman has torn ligaments in her leg and one knee is crushed.
This year, there will be more terrible situations with elevators due to the growing malfunction of elevator equipment.
THE PROSECUTOR GENERAL’S OFFICE WARNS OF THE DANGER
The Prosecutor General’s Office of Russia has warned about the threat to the life and health of citizens in 59 regions of Russia due to the non-inclusion in regional programs of measures to upgrade more than 47 thousand elevators with expiring service lives. The most dangerous situation has developed in Chuvashia, Udmurtia, and Altai. But do not think that the risk of falling into the elevator shaft is only in poor regions. St. Petersburg is among the cities with a large number of old elevators. Some elevators have been operating there since pre-revolutionary times.
Where did the figure of 47 thousand dangerous elevators come from when the apartment owners did not have enough money to pay for the replacement of 45 thousand elevators? The fact is that some of the old elevators belong to various organizations and institutions. Approximately 10,000 elevators are added to the number of elevators requiring urgent replacement every year.
HOW ARE THEY GOING TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM
The Russian Elevator Association (RLO) proposes to abolish VAT on the sale of elevators in order to reduce their cost by 18-20%.
Ideally, of course, regions that do not have enough money to replace outdated elevators should receive co-financing under a special program from the government of the Russian Federation. But now, when the state already has large expenditures in all directions, there is little hope of receiving such co-financing from the federal budget. Therefore, at the site of the Public Council under the Ministry of Construction, the Association “Russian Elevator Association” has developed a project “Accelerated elevator replacement”. Its essence is that the regions will receive an installment payment from the manufacturer or an elevator service company. And the residents of the house, the owners of privatized apartments, where this elevator will be updated, will have to slightly increase the capital repair fee. According to the idea, the elevator is replaced first, and after that, the owners pay for this service with their capital repair contributions for 5-7 years.
The paradoxical situation is that there are opportunities and capacities to solve the problem of replacing elevators throughout the country. But instead of organizing a correct and reasonable scheme for carrying out this work, officials invent some unthinkable schemes and conduct unnecessary negotiations. Is it really necessary for the president to intervene in order for people to move safely in elevators? It’s very similar to this…
Yana Polyanskaya
Photo: LEGION-MEDIA
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