Trapped and alone, she thought about her options then reached for her smartphone.
She tweeted the following message hoping the company affiliated with the lift could offer her a solution. Quickly.
"Guys. I'm trapped in an Amtrak elevator at BWI Airport. Help?"
Amtrak's social media team missed the message because Carpenter didn't include "@Amtrak" or any hashtags that might've popped up in their notifications. Without their help, she was released from the lift a short time later.
Almost seven months down the track, on September 7, Carpenter received a response out of the blue.
"We are sorry to hear that. Are you still in the elevator?" Amtrak's official Twitter account asked.
"Oh my thank you for this but I was trapped months ago. Like last February. Thanks for checking...? Ha," she responded.
Amtrak, which manages America's largest train network, later explained that they just wanted to make sure.
"Glad you're out," they wrote back the next day, followed by, "Not our finest hour yesterday."
But the internet was characteristically savage.
Carpenter was offered a free express train ticket for the inconvenience, which she accepted.