Metrorail riders faced smoke, an elevator entrapment and escalator injuries last week during their commutes, highlighting fears of what record crowds might confront next month during the Inauguration.
A stopped escalator at the Gallery Place station started moving during the morning commute Wednesday, bucking those walking up it into a pile-up, injuring two.
The next evening, a rider became entrapped in an elevator there.
Then Friday morning, smoke led officials to evacuate the Friendship Heights station and shut it down for about 30 minutes.
Broken equipment isn’t unusual in the aging transit system, but the problems don’t usually affect passengers beyond delaying their commutes.
However, the latest problems come as the transit system is gearing up for its biggest test next month, when as many as 4 million people are expected to come to the District for the four-day Inauguration weekend.
The most Metrorail has handled in a single day was 854,638 trips. On Jan. 20, Inauguration Day, Metro officials expect to double that.
Metro spokeswoman Angela Gates said the transit system will not rehabilitate any elevators until after the Inauguration, as it doesn’t want to take any elevators out of service to be rebuilt when the system will need as many working as possible. Metro officials have said they plan to have elevator and escalator repair teams on standby. They also have said they plan on shutting down some escalators for rider safety.
But the escalator incident, first reported by the Washington Post, involved an escalator that was already shut down.
On about 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, Gates said, about a dozen people were walking up a stopped escalator from the Yellow and Green line platform to the Red at the Gallery Place station, when the escalator turned on and started to move down.
Those walking on it were thrown off balance, with two taken to a local hospital for what Gates called minor injuries.
The escalator then stopped on its own, she said. “I really have no explanation of what happened,” Gates said Friday.
She said the agency routinely checks its escalators. Last year the system devoted a $30 million budget and 192-person staff to fix the system’s 588 escalators and 244 elevators.
Gates also said crews are investigating what caused the escalator to move Wednesday but probably won’t know what happened for at least a week. Still, she said, she wasn’t aware of it ever occurring before.
“This is an anomaly. This kind of thing never happens,” Gates said. “I don’t think anyone else should have to worry about other escalators.”
