Court Opinion

ID: 9582028
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:21:40.972335+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:37:24.239614
License: Public Domain

HARRISON, J.,
dissenting.
The trial judge found as a matter of law that the spillage of oil by the defendant was a remote cause of the collision and that the plaintiff was guilty of contributory negligence. I agree with both conclusions.
The oil spillage occurred about midday on December 10, 1973. The accident occurred several hours thereafter, during which time the highway had been used without incident by the traveling public. The spillage was admittedly due to the malfunction of a “whip hose” connection. Soon after the spillage occurred members of a local fire department and employees of the State Highway Department began their efforts to repair the road and to remove any hazard caused by the spillage. The duty to repair and to render safe the road was the responsibility of the Highway Department. While the defendant’s driver might have been more solicitous than he was, the evidence does not show any additional thing that he could have done to alleviate the condition that was not already being done by the Highway Department.
The hazard that existed at the intersection of Routes 7 and 719, and along 719, was an open and obvious one. Plaintiff saw the two large trucks parked in her lane on Route 719 and the highway employees at the scene. At least one of the trucks was equipped with a four-way flashing light and with a fireball flasher, and a highway department employee stated that the lights were operating. Plaintiff says that she brought her car to a complete stop and pulled around the trucks in first gear upon being waved to do so by a highway employee. Plaintiff noticed that the road was “wet and shining,” like fresh tar. She testified that her car remained in the lowest possible gear until she collided with the “Scout” vehicle, which had stopped with its right wheels off the pavement. Plaintiff first noticed the Scout when it *133was approximately 400 feet away. At the point when she detected that her vehicle was being affected by the condition of the highway, plaintiff was then some 200 feet from the stopped Scout. At that time plaintiff admits that she took “both feet off of the pedals” and “just held onto the steering wheel” until she collided with the parked vehicle. This amounted to a complete abandonment of control by the plaintiff.
I find it incredible that plaintiff’s automobile,-unhindered by other traffic or distractions, traveling upgrade in “low” or first gear, could not have been stopped, slowed, or controlled, or that some other evasive action could not have been taken by its driver, within a distance the equivalent of two-thirds the length of a football field. Obviously the accident involved in this case was caused by the excessive speed, under the existing circumstances, of plaintiff’s car, or by the complete inattention and ineptness of the plaintiff in the operation of her vehicle. In either event she was contributorily negligent. “Contributory negligence is nothing more than the failure of plaintiff to exercise ordinary care for his own safety. . . .” Yeary v. Holbrook, 171 Va. 266, 285, 198 S.E. 441, 450 (1938). Therefore, I dissent from the decision of the majority.