Patents by Inventor Johanna Whitwell

Johanna Whitwell has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Publication number: 20240140759
    Abstract: Disclosed is an elevator system, including a hoistway; an elevator car in the hoistway; sensors in the hoistway operationally coupled to the elevator car and configured to capture sensor data indicative of a person being in the hoistway, and a processor configured to determine from the sensor data that the person is in the hoistway; and wherein the elevator car is configured to reduce speed or stop when the processor determines the person is in the hoistway.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 21, 2022
    Publication date: May 2, 2024
    Inventors: Appalaraju Marpu, Malleswara Reddy Gutti, Stefan Ey, Javier Muñoz Sotoca, Luis Mena, Peter Herkel, Jan Ruhnke, Felix Donath, Colette Ruden, Randy Roberts, Craig Drew Bogli, Johanna Whitwell, Mustapha Toutaoui, Sylvain Kabre
  • Patent number: 11964848
    Abstract: An elevator system includes a hoistway, an elevator car configured to travel in the hoistway, and a pit located at a bottom of the hoistway. A safety chain is configured to enable or disable motion of the elevator car, and a sensor assembly is configured to initiate opening the safety chain to disable motion of the elevator car upon detection of a person in a detection region of the sensor assembly in the hoistway. A test device is configured to test operation of the sensor assembly to detect malfunctioning and/or tampering of operation of the sensor assembly.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 12, 2023
    Date of Patent: April 23, 2024
    Assignee: OTIS ELEVATOR COMPANY
    Inventors: Randy Roberts, Johanna Whitwell, Craig Drew Bogli
  • Patent number: 11912534
    Abstract: A safety net system is provided for an elevator system that includes an elevator pit. The safety net system includes a sensor and a processor. The sensor is arranged in a plane along a bottom of the elevator pit and is configured to perform sensing to sense an object disposed along the plane and to generate data corresponding to results of the sensing. The processor is operably coupled to the sensor and is configured to analyze the data and to determine whether the data is indicative of a person in the elevator pit based on analysis results.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 12, 2023
    Date of Patent: February 27, 2024
    Assignee: OTIS ELEVATOR COMPANY
    Inventors: Randy Roberts, Johanna Whitwell, Craig Drew Bogli, Kyler Vensel
  • Patent number: 11851305
    Abstract: A method of operating a safety net system of an elevator system is provided. The method includes installing a sensor in an elevator pit of the elevator system and executing a learning phase of the sensor to verify successful installation of the sensor. The executing of the learning phase includes causing the sensor to sense physical characteristics of a portion of the elevator pit when the elevator pit is known to have certain physical characteristics to generate a background reading, comparing the background reading against a reading associated with known physical characteristics of the portion of the elevator pit and verifying the successful installation of the sensor based on results of the comparing.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 12, 2023
    Date of Patent: December 26, 2023
    Assignee: OTIS ELEVATOR COMPANY
    Inventors: Randy Roberts, Johanna Whitwell, Craig Drew Bogli, Kyler Vensel