Opinion ID: 2234055
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Duty to Provide for Taking Precautions Under Restatement (Second) Sections 413 and 416.

Text: Under sections 413 and 416 of the Restatement (Second) of Torts, one who employs an independent contractor may be liable if the work performed by the contractor involves a peculiar unreasonable risk of harm to others. Under section 413, the employer has a duty to either (1) contractually allocate to the contractor the burden of taking precautions against a peculiar unreasonable risk of physical harm to others, or (2) exercise reasonable care to provide in some manner for such precautions if the employer should recognize that the work is likely to create such a risk. Restatement (Second) § 413, at 384-85; Kragel v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 537 N.W.2d 699, 703 (Iowa 1995) (stating section 413 addresses liability of the employer because of the employer's actual fault). Under section 416, the employer may be held vicariously liable for the negligence of the contractor performing the work even though the employer has contractually or otherwise provided for precautions against the peculiar risk. Restatement (Second) § 416, at 395; Kragel, 537 N.W.2d at 703 (stating employer's liability under section 416 is vicarious). We have previously considered whether work performed by contractors involved risks so peculiar as to justify liability under these sections of the Restatement (Second). In two early cases, both involving roofing work, we found the exceptions applied and that a general contractor owed a duty to an employee of an independent contractor. Trushcheff v. Abell-Howe Co., 239 N.W.2d 116 (Iowa 1976); Giarratano v. Weitz Co., 259 Iowa 1292, 147 N.W.2d 824 (1967). In Giarratano, without discussing why the employee's work atop the roof eighty feet above the ground involved a peculiar risk, we summarily concluded substantial evidence of a peculiar risk appeared in the record supporting the existence of a duty on the part of the general contractor under sections 413 and 416. [5] Giarratano, 259 Iowa at 1308, 147 N.W.2d at 834. Similarly, in Trushcheff, in summary fashion and without conducting an analysis of the features of Trushcheff's roofing work that created a peculiar risk, we observed it cannot be plausibly argued [the general contractor] owed Trushcheff no duty of care at the time of the accident under sections 413 and 416. Trushcheff, 239 N.W.2d at 126. We next addressed the concept of peculiar risk in Porter v. Iowa Power & Light Co., 217 N.W.2d 221 (Iowa 1974). The City of Altoona contracted with a paving contractor for the construction of a paving project. Porter, 217 N.W.2d at 226. Porter, who was employed by the contractor, was electrocuted when a co-employee operating a crane brought it in contact with Iowa Power's electric line. Id. Porter's administrator sued the city, the city's engineer, and the power company alleging the defendants negligently failed to provide a safe workplace and to warn of the danger from the electrical line. Id. at 231. Affirming the district court's refusal to submit to the jury specifications of negligence based on sections 413 and 416, we concluded the presence of electric transmission and distribution lines near streets is a matter of common knowledge and a hazard that a paving contractor can reasonably be expected to take precautions against to prevent electrocution of its employees. Id. at 232-33. Accordingly, we concluded the city owed no duty to Porter because the risk of physical injury arising from the electric lines was not a peculiar risk. Id. at 233. Many types of industrial work involve some significant degree of risk that is outside the definition of peculiar risk under the Restatement (Second) sections 413 and 416. In yet another case arising from an injury sustained by an employee of a roofing contractor, we expressly considered [w]hat types of work by their very nature, involve a peculiar risk of harm. Lunde v. Winnebago Indus., Inc., 299 N.W.2d 473, 478 (Iowa 1980). We reasoned a peculiar risk of harm as contemplated in section 416 inheres in the nature of the work. Id. at 477-78. Ordinary construction work requires routine precautions `which any careful contractor could reasonably [be] expected to take,' and is therefore not generally considered to involve a peculiar risk. Id. at 478 (quoting Porter, 217 N.W.2d at 232). Hazards introduced by the negligence of the contractor, rather than by the inherently dangerous nature of the work, are also not classified as peculiar risks. Id. at 479. Consistent with the rule stated in Lunde, we subsequently held the use of scaffolding in a residential construction project did not involve a peculiar risk. Downs v. A & H Constr., Ltd., 481 N.W.2d 520, 526-27 (Iowa 1992). Our court of appeals applied the same rule in deciding an employee of an independent contractor who inhaled gas fumes and sustained a brain injury while cutting and capping a live gas line in a trench was not injured as a consequence of a peculiar risk. Hernandez v. Midwest Gas Co., 523 N.W.2d 300, 305 (Iowa Ct. App.1994). Applying the principles derived from the foregoing authorities, we conclude the risk that asbestos fibers would be carried home by Van Fossen and cause injury to Ann was not a risk that inhered in the construction and maintenance work performed by Van Fossen as an iron worker at the Port Neal facility. It was instead a risk that was occasioned by the failure of Ebasco and Klinger to employ routine precautionary measures against ordinary and customary dangers that MidAmerican and IPL could reasonably assume would be undertaken by any careful contractor. These routine measures could have, for example, included workplace laundering or other safe management of clothing worn by construction workers exposed to asbestos at the Port Neal plant. Accordingly, we conclude the district court correctly determined the risk which led to the injury claimed by the plaintiff was not a peculiar risk under sections 413 and 416. [6]