Opinion ID: 1389048
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Unexpectedness

Text: Employer contends the repetitive event which causes a repetitive trauma injury is not unexpected but is part of the worker's normal work activity. Because the event causing the injury is not unexpected, Employer argues repetitive trauma injury cannot be compensable as an injury by accident. Under § 42-1-160, a claimant is entitled to benefits for an injury by accident arising out of and in the course of employment. In Layton v. Hammond-Brown-Jennings Co., 190 S.C. 425, 3 S.E.2d 492 (1939), we interpreted for the first time the meaning of injury by accident under the newly enacted Workman's Compensation Act. We noted that two lines of cases had evolved in other jurisdictions: some jurisdictions, including North Carolina upon which our Act is modeled, held there must be some unusual or unlooked-for mishap resulting in injury to constitute an accident; other jurisdictions held no mishap was required for an accident so long as there was an unexpected injury occurring while the employee was performing his usual duties in his customary manner. We chose the latter definition, focusing on the unexpected nature of the injury rather than requiring that the event causing the injury be unexpected. This definition of accident as an unexpected injury has been reiterated in a long line of cases. See, e.g., Colvin v. E.I. DuPont De Nemours Co., 227 S.C. 465, 88 S.E.2d 581 (1955) (injury by accident is an injury occurring unexpectedly without the prior occurrence of any external event of an accidental nature); Hiers v. Brunson Const. Co., 221 S.C. 212, 70 S.E.2d 211 (1952) (injury by accident is an injury that is accidental in that it is unforeseen and unexpected). [3] As we more recently stated, in determining whether something constitutes an injury by accident the focus is not on some specific event, but rather on the injury itself. Stokes v. First Nat'l Bank, 306 S.C. 46, 50, 410 S.E.2d 248, 250 (1991). Further, an injury is unexpected, bringing it within the category of accident, if the worker did not intend it or expect it would result from what he was doing. Colvin, 227 S.C. at 468-69, 88 S.E.2d at 582 (emphasis added). Therefore, if an injury is unexpected from the worker's point of view, it qualifies as an injury by accident. Here, there is no evidence Claimant intended or expected to be injured as a result of her repetitive work activity. Employer's contention that the cause of the injury must be unexpected is incorrect. Under South Carolina law, if the injury itself is unexpected, it is compensable as an injury by accident.