If you're of a certain age, I'm sure you'll remember the welly boot getting crushed.... Yes, it's another one of those public information films that scared us as nippers! With thanks to Mark Prosser for the clip.
This definitely made me think twice about using escalators to store my shoes and wellies - they are so much safer kept on a shoe rack under the stairs.
I remember this from the 1980s when I was a toddler. The image of the blue boot being crushed scared me to death! Every time after that I couldn't get on an escalator without freaking out!
Yes, but this ad's from the 70s, when escalators were essentially giant electric razors. Lethal, they were. Our Uncle Don used to go to the precinct every Tuesday and lie down at the foot of the escalators by Bejam, drape his head over the edge and get a tidy trim - said it was better than he'd get down at Dirty Bernard's barber shop. Eventually they told him he couldn't do it any more as it wasn't safe and he'd already lost one ear, but that'd been loose for ages anyway.
I remember my mother telling me not to play on the escalator because your clothes could get caught, and you could be strangled to death. She never mentioned anything like THIS happening.
My mother said she heard a horror story back in the 70s of a woman wearing a long scarf 🧣 that fell down to her feet and it caught in the escalator and the scarf was wrapped so tightly around her neck she was strangled.
This 'public information film' traumatised me for years. I had to be carried onto the escalator, until I got too old then we'd have to take the stairs! I thought children were getting sucked in!
I have kids now, and I freak out when they piss around on the escalators because of this advert. I'm showing it to them tonight, that'll keep them in line. :)
The most important safety advice besides staying away from the sides: Take a step at the end of the escalator; that "comb" that the steps go under often has crooked teeth.
I love it. The boot gets squished, the escalator kept moving, didn't even slow down. And if you try to stand on an escalator without walking down, you nearly gt pushed off the side by impatient people behind you!
Well, I remember seeing it when I was a nipper c.'83-84 (and it terrifying me), and my own personal copy was taped around '88, so it had a fairly long run.
Even though I was born in September 1986 I remember seeing a very similar (if not the same) film on tv when I was about 3 or 4 and obviously was scared so much that I can still remember it. I remember it was the image of the yellow wellie being squished, yeah it was probably this one I saw
_You find escalators everywhere these days, and we take them for granted. But don't take your child's safety for granted. Accidents can happen. Teach some of the three safeguards. Stand still and don't walk down. Stand steady and hold hands. Stand clear, away from the sides and well within the yellow lines. Don't let this... [boot squeak sound] happen to your child. Stand still. Stand steady. Stand clear._
I like the voice-over on this one. Very few people stand still on these, especially on the tube, 'cos they're in a hurry. I don't like holding the handrail because of COVID and contamination.
I see kids playing on escalators all the time at department stores, and it seems nobody's really watching them. I usually warn them, but they don't listen...of course. :P
this ad rly freaked me but the public safety film tht scared me the most was the thing about being trapped in a fire tht was aired back in '02 after watching that i was so scared about fires 4 almost 2 years!
I got my welly stuck in an escalator once and died. I got better but I'd learned a serious lesson and to this day don't go near them any more. I once had to be winched from the bottom of Oxford Circus Tube Station.
I had forgotten the trauma of this until going down some travelators at the supermarket while they had wellies on. This was shown in the 80s also as I was born 82.
what's truly chilling in hindsight is the public information films with jimmy savile. yes, the ones where he's going around childrens wards in hospitals.
What I like to do is tip backward on my heels at the bottom. My toes come up so that the bottom level gets under my toes. Then I lean forward and start walking. This method is quite nice. I also walk down escalators just like normal stairs. I dont see what the fuss is about. However I am the guy who was walking around with shoes untied and when the front door closed on my shoelaces i went down on all 4 knees.
They showed this ad in the 80's too when i was a kid. The bit with the boot getting crushed always made me turn my head away. To this day my Mum always tells me to be careful on escalators becuase of the ad!
I was in Hong Kong recently, and on the subway escalators there, they actually have warnings about not using mobile phones when using an escalator. that went something like "HOLD THE HANDRAIL, AND DO NOT LOOK AT MOBILE PHONE". Presumably because the HK subway has had more accidents involving the public with looking at TikTok, than actual accidents with been trapped or crushed by the escalator itself.
Don't know if anyone else noticed, but most recent escalators no longer have the bold yellow warning lines painted on them, as seen in this commercial.
I was in the Victoria Shopping Centre in Nottingham once, and I had to press the emergency stop button when an old lady got the hem of her dress caught in the sides.
I hated escalators so much when I was younger that I realised that pressing the red button stopped them, which I did in Lewis’s, an old department store in Birmingham on a packed Saturday before Christmas.
Has this actually ever happened?! I'm still scared of escalators but I guess this film has done its job as I always think of it every time I use an escalator.
There was another PIF about the dangers of escalators - it had a girl drop her rag doll at the bottom which got shredded. I refused to go on escalators until I was about 13!
I like the accent- very serious. I intentionally take my shoe and hold it up against the brush that is usually on the side- i've never seen a yellow like on that-good idea though. But the brush always gives me a good, free "shoe shine"
I never saw this (American kid) but there was this rescue 911 Episode where a toddler got trapped in the escalator at the top, and I think it had the same effect...Of course, he was sitting on the damn thing.
when i worked in a department store,a woman tried going up the escalator with a pushchair and a young girl of about 6 holding her hand.the young girl slipped down,luckily my colleague was nearby to push the safety button at the bottom.the girl ended up with just a few grazes but i still shudder when i think of what could have happened.
This film is why i was terrified of escalators. I'm in my 30's now and have only recently started using them! Those damn films created a generation of scaredy-cats
