“Worst Nightmare” — 12-Year-Old’s School Project Gets Woman Stuck in Elevator
A woman was stuck in an elevator after a 12-year-old girl used a school project to try and stop the door from closing. It didn't work.
May 20 2024, Published 1:32 p.m. ET
A woman on TikTok named Brit (@brittto__) ended up getting stuck in an elevator after a 12-year-old girl tried holding it for her mother. Part of the kid's elevator-delay strategy was a cardboard poster project she made for school, which she left on the floor in what was probably a bid to keep the door from closing.
Brit explained in a viral clip that this didn't work:
"Not me, trapped in an elevator because this little girl wanted to hold the door to wait for her mom so she used her project to hold the door. And she held it for so long that the doors were like, nope, we're closing," Brit said into the camera.
"And she kept her cardboard thing in the door and I'm like thinking, well the doors are closing on it, I'm thinking she's gonna pull it out. She doesn't pull it out; I just watch it go from like the floor up to the top because obviously the elevator's moving," she explained while moving her outstretched hand upwards to illustrate how the elevator moved up with the poster still in it.
"And now the elevator's jammed because her project is stuck," the TikToker stated, showing the kid's assignment jammed in the elevator door. "And I'm like a floor's stuck in the elevator. I don't know what to do," she said, backing up from the door before the video ultimately closes out.
She placed some additional context about the situation in a caption for the video, writing: "Ruined a 12-year-old girl's art project on my way to work today, wait to see the damage."
One recurring question that kept popping up in the comments section of the video was how long Brit was stuck in the elevator and what ultimately happened in the situation. The TikToker obliged in a follow-up clip, explaining exactly what the elevator action was all about.
She begins her story by stating she was in an elevator at her condo, which must be a really big building because Britt stated that she was traveling down from the 54th floor. After stopping on the 48th, that's when the young girl with her school project appeared. She asked if it was OK for her to wait for her mom as she stopped the elevator door from closing.
Brit said that wouldn't be a problem, but more and more time progressed to the point where the elevator just shut the door, not stopping for whoever was standing in its way, the young girl included. The girl decided to hop out, but left her project on the floor in what was presumably an attempt to keep it from closing.
Unfortunately for the 12-year-old, this wasn't the case — the door ended up closing on her project and the elevator proceeded to head down. Britt thought that before it began moving that the young girl would've simply pulled it from out of the door, as it's a flat piece of cardboard.
The TikToker said that she heard the young girl screaming and crying from the other side of the elevator, adding that the elevator only moved down a floor before stopping. She said that while she could've probably pulled the project closer to her and into the elevator with her, she didn't want to wreck the young girl's work, as maybe some of it could've been salvaged.
Instead, she opted to call for some assistance, because whenever someone else arrived to pry the doors open, maybe a good part of the project could've remained intact.
Folks on the elevator phone started trying to talk her through different ways she could attempt to get out of the elevator, but Britt said none of these methods were working.
Not wanting to have firefighters arrive and have one of them ask if she attempted to pull the cardboard out, Britt began pulling out the assignment. While she was able to get a massive chunk of the poster board into the elevator, there were still some bits stuck in between the doors. So she began digging into the door, extricating the smaller pieces of the assignment, until the doors finally closed and the elevator headed downstairs.
After she finally made it to the ground floor, she said that when the doors opened, the mom and the daughter were waiting on the other side. Instead of being apologetic to her, the TikToker said the mom sternly said "That's my daughter's project" and ripped it out of her hands.
The mom then went right back into the elevator and headed upstairs, Britt said. Commenters who responded to her follow-up couldn't believe the mother's reaction, stating that they were stunned to see how she was acting as if Brit was at fault for her daughter leaving her poster in path of the closing elevator door.
"Not the mom acting like you caused it," one person penned.
Another echoed, "The mom sounds like a nightmare."
Someone else said they couldn't believe Brit was being so kind about the situation only to see the mother give her an attitude for her daughter's project getting wrecked: "I would’ve ripped that project so fast…"
Someone else wrote: "Omg, I thought they were waiting to make sure you were OK and apologize…"
What do you think of the situation? How would have you acted if you were in Brit's situation and her mother ended up snatching the project out of your hand?