The Novembers’ tragic UPS cargo plane crash in Louisville is a reminder that knowing about a dangerous condition and failing to act may have devastating consequences. In this case, the plane crashed into a city neighborhood, killing 15. This issue isn’t just about cargo jets. It covers any potentially dangerous machine and those who make, sell, and operate them.
The Four Elements of Negligence
Most personal injury claims are based on the negligence theory of law. Under Kentucky’s personal injury law, proving negligence requires establishing four elements: duty, breach, causation, and damages. They are a framework for holding parties accountable when serious mistakes harm others:
- The duty of care is a legal obligation one party owes to others. It exists in countless situations. Drivers owe other motorists and pedestrians a duty to operate their vehicles safely, property owners must maintain safe premises, and manufacturers owe consumers a duty to produce safe products. The scope of this duty depends on the parties’ relationship and the circumstances involved
- A breach of duty happens when a party doesn’t meet the standard of care in a given situation. This can happen because they took an action, but not well enough, or failed to act. This is where a defendant’s knowledge of a dangerous condition is important. If someone knows about a hazard and fails to address it, and their conduct falls below the expected standard of care, you’ve established this element
- You must prove the defendant’s breach directly caused your accident and injuries, making it the factual and legal (or proximate) cause. You must connect the negligent act or failure to act with the medical, personal, and financial harm you suffer
- Damages measure your harm in dollars. They can be medical expenses, lost wages, pain and suffering, and, in a wrongful death case, what you’re missing because of a family member’s death. Without damages, your personal injury claim will be dismissed
If you have strong evidence supporting each element, chances are good you’ll obtain reasonable compensation for your personal injury claim.
The Role of Prior Knowledge
When a defendant knows about a dangerous condition before an accident, and that condition is at least a partial cause of it, it may greatly strengthen your case that a breach of duty occurred.
Hindsight is 20/20, but if someone knows that there’s a risk a condition may cause injuries or death and chooses to do little or nothing about it, there’s a much better chance a defendant (and or its insurance company) will prefer to settle a case than risk an angry or disgusted jury from awarding you substantial damages.
What the reasonable thing to do in your case depends on the circumstances. There are many issues to consider when deciding whether knowledge of a dangerous condition should’ve caused the party to address it, including the following:
- How certain the information was
- How serious the injuries may be if something goes wrong
- The time between learning about the condition and the accident
- The costs of repairing or correcting the condition
- The degree of certainty that injuries will happen sooner than later
Depending on the evidence, if a party knows of a dangerous condition, it’s pretty certain injuries or deaths will happen as a result, and they do nothing about it, the situation may be so extreme that a jury may decide you’re entitled to punitive damages. They’re not meant to compensate you for your losses, but to punish a defendant for their extreme indifference and to discourage it, and others, from doing the same thing again in the future.
The UPS Cargo Plane Crash as an Example
In the late afternoon of November 4, a UPS McDonnell-Douglas MD-11 took off from the Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport for Hawaii. This is an older plane manufactured between 1998 and 2000 by a company later bought by Boeing. These models have three engines, one on each main wing and one on the tail.
Fully loaded with fuel for the long trip, shortly after takeoff, an engine from one of the wings, and the pylon attaching it to the wing, fell off. The plane went out of control and crashed into a nearby neighborhood. Three crew members and 12 people on the ground were killed, according to the Courier Journal.
The investigation into the crash isn’t complete, so we don’t have a full picture of what went wrong. But investigators have revealed that Boeing identified cracks in the engine mounting assembly on similar MD-11 aircraft as far back as fifteen years before this accident, the BBC reports.
The company documented failures of the same parts on four occasions, affecting three aircraft. Boeing issued a service letter to plane operators in 2011. It warned them about the problem and recommended visual inspections every five years. Boeing concluded that this structural flaw “would not result in a safety of flight condition.”
Crash victims will file lawsuits, and they will likely name as defendants all the parties that may have been involved in the plane’s takeoff and crash (including Boeing).
If this known problem caused, or at least partially caused, the deaths of 15 people, and a defendant (potentially UPS) knew about this letter (or should’ve known about it), and didn’t at least inspect this plane, if not overhaul it or take it out of service, the plaintiffs may have gone a long way to proving the defendants breached their duty of reasonable care.
The same would apply to anyone injured by a machine with a known safety problem that wasn’t addressed, and who was injured as a result. It could be a car, a chainsaw, a bicycle, a power tool, or a kitchen appliance. The elements of a negligence claim apply across the board, whether that’s someone severely shocked by a defective toaster or a person killed by a plane falling out of the sky.
Were You or a Loved One Injured in an Accident? If So, We Can Help
This isn’t the time to try to settle a case yourself. Your potential recovery, if the case is handled correctly, could be substantial, so you may have a lot to lose by trying a DIY approach. Call The Fleck Firm at (270) 446-7000 to schedule your free consultation. We’ll discuss your accident, how Kentucky law may apply, and your best options to proceed. Insurance companies have lawyers. You should have one, too.
