Court Opinion

ID: 9596184
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:46:55.024689+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:01:34.717911
License: Public Domain

BONEY, Chief Justice
(dissenting).
I agree with the majority opinion that deference is owed to the findings of fact entered by the Alaska Workmen’s Compensation Board and that those findings should be “accepted unless they are unsupported by substantial evidence on the record considered as a whole.”1 I also agree that reasonable recreation at remote sites, being in the interest of the employer as well as the employee, is an incident of employment at such sites. Injuries from reasonable recreation at remote sites are thus properly to be compensated for under our workmen’s compensation law.
However, in the instant case, I find myself unable to accept either that pole-climbing was reasonable recreation or that the finding by the Alaska Workmen’s Compensation Board that it was is not unsupported by substantial evidence on the record as a whole. The majority opinion too lightly dismisses the employer’s argument that remote site recreation injuries should be compensable only if the recreation was either sponsored by the employer or commonly engaged in by the employees. I would hold that remote site recreation is reasonable, and that injuries resulting therefrom are compensable, only where: the employer offers no recreational facilities and therefore forces his employees to seek their own recreation; or, the employee is injured using in a reasonable way the recreational facilities provided by the employer; or, the injury results from a foreseeable and reasonable activity in which human beings may be expected to engaged.2 In each of the cases relied upon *294by the majority at least one of the above three factors was present; 3 here none are.4 In their absence, I would hold that there is no evidence supporting the Board’s conclusion that the recreation was reasonable. I would therefore affirm the decision of the superior court reversing the Board and denying compensation benefits.

. O’Leary v. Brown-Pacific-Maxon, Inc., 340 U.S. 504, 508, 71 S.Ct. 470, 95 L.Ed. 483, 487 (1951).

. Unless sucli limitations are imposed, the employer becomes absolutely liable for remote site recreation injuries. As Justice Harlan stated in his dissent from O’Keeffe v. Smith, Hinchman & Grylls Associates, Inc., 380 U.S. 359, 370, 85 S.Ct. 1012, 1018, 13 L.Ed.2d 895, 902 (1965):
To permit compensation for such injuries is to impose absolute liability upon the employer for any and all injuries, whatever their nature, what*294ever their cause, just so long as the Deputy Commissioner makes an award and the job location is one to which the reviewing judge would not choose to go if he had his choice of vacation spots.
Furthermore, failure to impose such limitations induces employers to forego the added expenses of providing recreational facilities since such provision in no way lessens their potential liability.

. No facilities: O’Keeffe v. Smith, Hinchman & Grylls Associates, Inc., 380 U.S. 359, 360, 85 S.Ct. 1012, 13 L.Ed.2d 895, 896 (1965); Hastorf-Nettles, Inc. v. Pillsbury, 203 F.2d 641, 642 (9th Cir. 1953). Using facilities: Self v. Hanson, 305 F.2d 699, 702 (9th Cir. 1962); Northern Corporation v. Saari, 409 P.2d 845, 846 (Alaska 1966) (travelling from facilities). Reasonable and foreseeable human activity: O’Leary v. Brown-Pacific-Maxon, Inc., 340 U.S. 504, 508, 71 S.Ct. 470, 95 L.Ed.2d 483, 487 (1951); O’Keeffe v. Pan American World Airways, Inc., 338 F.2d 319, 321 (5th Cir. 1964), cert. denied, 380 U.S. 951, 85 S.Ct. 1083, 13 L.Ed.2d 969 (1965); Pan American World Airways, Inc. v. O’Hearne, 335 F.2d 70, 71 (4th Cir. 1964), cert. denied, 380 U.S. 950, 85 S.Ct. 1080, 13 L.Ed.2d 968 (1965); Self v. Hanson, 305 F.2d 699, 700, 702 (9th Cir. 1962).

. Recreational facilities were provided; Anderson was not using the jtrovided facilities; pole-climbing is not a foreseeable and reasonable activity in which human beings may be expected to engage.