Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times  Rescuers needed hours on Wednesday to free the body of Suzanne Hart, 41, who worked at the advertising firm Y&R.  Then, in an inexplicable instant, after Ms. Hart placed one foot inside, the elevator suddenly lurched up, its door still open, according to the Fire Department. It dragged her until she was pinned between the elevator and the wall, between the first and second floors, the police said.  Two passengers in the elevator car could only watch in horror, and would remain trapped in the elevator for an hour before rescuers could free them.  Ms. Hart was declared dead at the scene, but her body was not removed until nearly 7 p.m.  There are about 60,000 elevators in New York City, which were involved in 53 accidents last year. But just three of them were fatal, making the mechanics and the violence of Ms. Hart’s death all the more unusual.  The specter of something as mundane as an elevator ride turning deadly haunted the building, at 285 Madison Avenue, and its stricken workers for the rest of the day. The building was evacuated, and employees were told to work from home on Thursday. Friends and family of Ms. Hart reeled in shock, struggling to come to terms with the loss of a woman they uniformly described as generous, driven and warm.  Ms. Hart was a director of new business and content at Y&R, formerly Young & Rubicam, which represents brands like Campbell Soup, Land Rover and Xerox. She had worked there since June 2007, according to her profile on LinkedIn, and quickly developed a reputation for working long hours while maintaining a spirit that knitted people together.  “Suzanne was just one of the most wonderful people in the world,” said Chad Kawalec, a former director of client services at Y&R.  “She was constantly trying to orchestrate teams of people who had never worked together, but she magically got them to work together.”  Ms. Hart’s father, Alex Hart, called her “the most marvelous daughter imaginable.”  “No father could have ever been more proud of her,” he said by phone from his home in Florida, weeping as he spoke.  As of Wednesday night, investigators had not determined what caused the malfunction of the elevator, one of 13 at 285 Madison, a 28-story building at the corner of 40th Street that was built in 1926. Records from the city’s Department of Buildings show there were 14 open violations involving the building’s elevators, two of them dating to last year. But a spokesman for the agency said none of those violations were for hazardous conditions.  “This particular elevator was last inspected in June 2011, and no safety issues were found at that time, and no conditions were found that would be related to this accident,” the spokesman, Tony Sclafani, said.  As rare as elevator accidents are, Mr. Kawalec said the elevators at 285 Madison Avenue were old and creaky. “They weren’t the kind of elevators that you stuck your hand in to catch the doors,” he said, “because they wouldn’t stop.”  This month, Y&R announced plans to move to 3 Columbus Circle, near the Time Warner Center, partly because the Madison Avenue building was a warren of small offices and the agency wanted open spaces. Other tenants in the building, including Kang & Lee, Blast Radius, BrandBuzz and Bravo, planned to move, too.  David Sable, a Y&R executive, said 285 Madison was “not a suitable building for us and probably hasn’t been for a number of years.”  Outside the high-pressure world of advertising, Ms. Hart harbored a creative and nurturing side.  Michael Meseke, who lived across the hall from Ms. Hart at her former residence on Carmine Street in the West Village for about five years, said she filled her home with small paintings she was working on and grew lush plants on the fire escape.  Mr. Meseke recalled that when his parents visited from California, Ms. Hart would stay at her boyfriend’s apartment so that his parents could use her place.  Andrea Meyer, who lives on the building’s fourth floor, said she and Ms. Hart frequently joked and commiserated about their mutual desire to shed weight. “She was always trying to lose 10 pounds, like me, and when she did, she was so excited,” Ms. Meyer said.  A few years ago, Ms. Hart met Chris Dickson, who would become her boyfriend. About a year ago, the couple moved to an apartment in Brooklyn Heights, where friends say Ms. Hart realized one of her dreams — to have her own garden in the city.  As dusk fell, reporters gathered outside the four-story Brooklyn building where Ms. Hart and Mr. Dickson lived. Appearing briefly on the stoop out front, Mr. Dickson spoke briefly about Ms. Hart.  “She’s a beautiful person, and I don’t have words for this,” he said. “I loved her.”  Reporting was contributed by Al Baker, Stuart Elliott, Meredith Hoffman, Ray Rivera and Tim Stelloh.
The victim had one foot in the elevator car of a Madison Avenue office building when the car began to ascend.