Court Opinion

ID: 9766339
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:42:19.21889+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:21.541105
License: Public Domain

POPE, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. The majority correctly holds that the trial court’s instructed verdict against Lucille Weicher may not be grounded upon a contention that she did not suffer a heat stroke. I disagree only with that part of the majority’s opinion which holds that she was not subjected to a greater hazard than the general public. Both she and another co-employee testified to facts which show her exposure to a greater hazard.
Lucille Weicher testified that she suffered heat exhaustion while working in the Liquidation Center, which comprised some seven or eight bargain departments located across the street from the main retail building of Montgomery Ward. Her place of employment was a temporary location, the usual place of business being remodeled. This temporary facility had previously been used by the Container Corporation for manufacturing boxes. She described it as an old building with windows that tilted out. The outside heat on July 15, 1963 was between eighty-four and eighty-nine degrees, as stated by the majority opinion. The outside wind velocity was seven to eight knots.
In addition to those weather conditions, which affected the general public the same as Lucille Weicher, there were conditions which intensified the risk as to her in the course of her employment. She was working in the heat. It is true that she stated in answer to one question that her work required nothing more than standing. She also testified that the work required her to pick up bundles of merchandise, carry them to the counter where her register was located, and there mark down the merchandise. She was doing this when she was stricken. She testified that her department “was pretty well enclosed after you get all of the dress racks and all of the merchandise around. Some of the dress racks were about as tall as I was.” She said the racks were tall enough to cut off any breeze flowing through the area. The dress racks “blocked the outside air from the windows * * The building was ventilated by some large pedestal fans. She testified that she and her fellow employees had asked for more fans but were advised that there were no more. When asked if the employees brought ice water to work with them, she replied, “We all had to.” A fact finder could reasonably conclude from this evidence that she was confined within a hot area which was inadequately ventilated, although the general public was not.
W. S. Lile, a co-worker, who was present in the same department at the time of Mrs. Weicher’s injury, also testified. He said “it was very, very hot, I know, I felt it too, *109I felt it.” When asked if any complaints had been lodged about the working conditions he answered “Yes, for the heat, yes, I did, we all did.” He said that the temperature on July 15 was “steamy and hot and close that day.” When asked about the cooling devices used in the building, he said, “I don’t recall how many, but there was one or two of these large old fans in there, most of the building didn’t have any at all, they were short of the big fans in the store, so we couldn’t get enough to help us out.” On cross-examination he was asked if there were a number of other employees on the job when Mrs. Weicher became ill. He answered, “I wouldn’t say all of the regular employees, or all of the extras were there, because there were days after days that a lot of them were out sick because they’d get sick from this heat, fortunately I didn’t * * His answer was then interrupted. Also when asked on cross-examination if he would not have preferred to work in an air-conditioned building, he replied, “I wouldn’t work under that condition again. If I had to work that way again, I would retire. I wouldn’t go back in it now.” From this evidence a fact finder could decide that Lucille Weicher was working in a close and hot area in which there was no movement of air. It shows that her working conditions were more oppressive than conditions which operated upon members of the general public, who could move from one area to another, go outside or inside, and were not confined.
Compensation was ordered for the death of a workman by reason of heat prostration in Texas Employers’ Ins. Ass’n v. Moore, 279 S.W. 516 (Tex.Civ.App.192S, no writ). The facts stated in that opinion show that the workman was engaged in more arduous work and that the heat was more intense than is the situation in this case; but among the factors held by the court to evidence a greater hazard to the workman than to the general public, was the proof that the workman “was localized in an underground basement, much “hotter and more trying to work in than would have been the natural and unrestricted atmosphere of the outside.” ,See also Hebert v. New Amsterdam Casualty Co., 1 S.W.2d 608 (Tex.Comm.App.1928). It was said in American General Ins. Co. v. Webster, 118 S.W.2d 1082 (Tex.Civ.App.1938, writ dism.), “The location of the place of work and the condition of the premises may constitute such extra hazard, in whole or in part.”
I would reverse the judgment below and remand the cause for trial.
SMITH and GREENHILL, JJ., join in this dissent.