6-Week-Old Baby Dies After Stroller Falls Down Elevator Shaft

A 6-week-old baby died after a stroller she was in plunged several stories down an elevator shaft in New York City on Thursday, officials said.

The infant, Areej Ali, was killed inside her Brooklyn apartment building. She and her mother were on the 23rd floor of the complex when the elevator doors opened but without the elevator car, according to the Associated Press.

They both fell eight stories down the shaft before landing on top of the elevator car shortly before noon, the New York Daily News reported.

“That’s my grandchild,” the baby’s grandfather, Salah Ali, told CBS New York. “She was like a month old.”

Ali added that the baby’s mother, who suffered non-life threatening injuries, and his son were distraught and in “bad shape. “That’s his first child, only child,” Ali said.

The elevator was out of service during the incident, according to the AP. Many of the building’s tenants told reporters that the elevator has been faulty in the past. The city’s Department of Buildings said it is testing the other elevators in the building to “ensure they are operating safely,” the AP reports.