A lucky escape

I see that there was flash flooding in Toronto yesterday.   Not sure if it was a storm with rainfall of record intensity.  (I see that reports say 72mm fell in two hours, but the record daily rainfall is more like 97mm;  so it depends on how quickly the 97mm fell, I suppose.)

Anyway, two guys in the city had a very lucky escape from a situation you wouldn't think should happen in a modern building:

The Black Creek had certainly risen before, and the basement parking lot at 501 Alliance Ave., which backs onto the winding waterway, could flood.

Late Tuesday night, as Toronto saw a massive, rapid dump of rain, those left working at the eco-friendly commercial building were warned to check on their parked vehicles....

Freire, 34, and Gabriel Otrin, 27, an industrial designer working with Freire, decided to check on the Honda. They hopped into one of two elevators and rode down the top of the four-floor, loft-style building to the underground lot.

The elevator did not come to its usual stop. Rather, it splash landed, with a “whoosh.” And then began to fill with murky water....

There was a ceiling escape hatch that was apparently sealed shut. One mobile phone, with next to no service. An emergency alarm and intercom that proved useless, particularly once the water rose to that level. And two Toronto police officers, first to arrive, who plunged into water and managed to pry open the elevator doors, while the two trapped men stood on handrails and sucked air from about 30 centimetres of air between the elevator ceiling and their necks.