Court Opinion

ID: 9765854
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:22:31.629269+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:16.354480
License: Public Domain

Opinion by
Me. Justice Bell,
Is South Penn Oil Company entitled to a judgment non obstante veredicto?
A highway known as Route 666 in Warren County runs in a northerly-southerly direction, and in the vicinity of this tragic accident it is a level straight road which has a hard surface paving of approximately 16 feet in width. The evidence in this ease is unfortunately not clear with respect to a number of im*439portant facts. However, viewing the testimony in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, the jury could have found as follows.
On the westerly side of the road is a berm of approximately 1¡. feet in width which falls off rather sharply a distance of approximately 3 feet into a 10 inch deep (wide?) drainage ditch (for the highway). Defendant owns a naptha plant which is located between 200 and 300 feet west of the place where the accident occurred. A 2 inch gas line runs from the plant down toward the road. The line is made up of various joints of pipe through which natural gas is transported from the plant in an easterly direction. A wooded area begins approximately 25 feet west of the road. As the gas line emerges from the wooded area into a brush-cleared area, the pipe line becomes visible because half of it is buried and half is above ground. About 5 to 6 feet from the edge of the road, the 2 inch gas line emerges from the ground and passes over the ditch about 2 feet above the bottom of the ditch and then follows the incline of the bank toward the road; as it nears the road it enters and passes through the ground under the road.
Ewing’s truck, which was proceeding along Route 666 in a northerly direction, between midnight and 2 o’clock on the somewhat foggy morning of July 1, 1949, ran off the road and over the west berm and into the ditch or brush area beyond the ditch. Ewing did not testify at the trial.
There was no evidence that the truck ever ran into or ran across or struck the gas pipe. Plaintiff testified that the right wheel of the truck was in the ditch and its left wheel was on the berm of the highway. A mechanic, who went to repair the gas line, testified that the gas line had been broken off at the elbow or swing, bent in a sort of a semi-circle, and again broken off, *440pulled out of the union, which was approximately 11 feet from a connection back to the union, and the pipe was bent in a sort of semi-circle shape which would break it out of the cast iron elbow above. The evidence was so contradictory and confusing that it is very difficult, if not impossible to ascertain exactly where the break in the pipe was in proximity to the ditch or to the highway.
Ewing sought the assistance of the plaintiff (a passing automobilist) and gave him flares for the purpose of lighting the area adjacent to the damaged truck. Helm lighted several flares and as he walked with one of them near the vicinity of the broken gas pipe there was an explosion and he was “engulfed in a ball of fire.” His clothing caught on fire, and he suffered burns of the hands, right arm, back, legs, hips, face and ears. The jury returned an unusual verdict, to wit, a verdict in favor of plaintiff and against the gas oil company in the sum of $17,500, but not against Ewing. However, the jury made a special or specific finding: “Doyou find that Frank Ewing, (additional defendant), is liable over to defendant, South Penn Oil Company, for any damage that may be suffered by the latter as a result of your verdict?” The jury answered “Yes.”
No question is or could successfully be raised as to the negligence of Ewing, the truck driver, whom the jury could have found by reasonable and legitimate inference from the evidence, had negligently driven off the road and broken the gas pipe which caused plaintiffs injuries.
The South Penn Oil Company moved for a new trial and for judgment non obstante veredicto, both of which motions were dismissed; and a judgment was entered on the verdict from which judgment this appeal was taken.
*441The pertinent principles of law are well settled; borderline cases sometimes make their application very-difficult. A high degree of care must be exercised by those who erect or operate dangerous instrumentalities. Whether a failure to run the gas pipe line underground amounts to negligence is sometimes a question for the jury and sometimes a question for the Court. The narrow question in this case boils down to whether we can say as a matter of law that the gas oil company could not have reasonably foreseen the likelihood of harm to the plaintiff (or one of his class) resulting from the erection of its pipe line above the ground in an area so close to the highway.
The law is thus stated in Brusis v. Henkels, 376 Pa. 226, 102 A. 2d 146, at pages 228, 229, 230, 231. . Plaintiff has the two-fold burden of proving that the defendant was negligent and that his negligence was the proximate cause of the accident:” . . .’: Lanni v. P. R. R. Co., 371 Pa. 106, 109, 88 A. 2d 887.
“In Dahlstrom v. Shrum, 368 Pa., supra, the plaintiff was injured when an automobile operated by defendant struck and killed a man on a highway . . . [his] body was hurled through the air striking and injuring plaintiff, who was lawfully on the highway behind a bus from which she had alighted. This Court sustained a nonsuit . . . The Court [speaking through Mr. Justice Stearne] said (page 425): . Negligence is defined as the absence of care under the circumstances : Beck v. Stanley Company of America, 355 Pa. 608, 50 A. 2d 306; Palsgraf v. Long Island R. Co., 248 N. Y. 339, 162 N. E. 99. The test of negligence is whether the wrongdoer could have anticipated and foreseen the likelihood of harm to the injured person, resulting from his act: Scurfield v. Federal Laboratories, Inc., 335 Pa. 145, 6 A. 2d 559. In Palsgraf v. *442Long Island R. Co., supra, it was stated by Cardozo, C. J. (later Justice, United States Supreme Court) : “. . . the orbit of the danger as disclosed to the eye of reasonable vigilance would be the orbit of the duty.” ’
“ ‘. . . It is well settled that conduct is negligent only if the harmful consequences thereof could reasonably have been foreseen and prevented: Leoni v. Rein-hard, 327 Pa. 391, 194 A. 490; Franzen v. Goodman, 325 Pa. 518, 190 A. 888; White v. Roydhouse, 211 Pa. 13, 60 A. 316; Gaupin v. Murphy, 295 Pa. 214, 145 A. 123.’: Rockey v. Ernest, 367 Pa. 538, 541, 80 A. 2d 783.
“In Tua v. Brentwood Motor Coach Co. et al., 371 Pa. 570, 92 A. 2d 209, the Court said (page 575) : ‘. . . But it is a cardinal rule of law that “want of ordinary care consists in failure to anticipate what is reasonably probable — not what is remotely possible”: Camp v. Allegheny County, 263 Pa. 276, 282, 106 A. 314. . .’ ”
In Brusis v. Henkels defendants in order to install a 10 inch gas pipe had excavated and back-filled a trench along the north side of a berm of the road. The berm extended 15 inches to 2 feet from the paved portion of the highway and the shoulders were still soft and dangerous. Warning signs (for soft and dangerous shoulders) were posted on the trench side so they could be seen by automobilists traveling on that side of the road. This Court held that the contractor was not liable to a tractor-trailer driver who drove off the paved highway on the wrong side of the road.
The instant case is even stronger for the defendant than the Brusis case. The likelihood of harm to the plaintiff (or to other users of the highway) could not have been reasonably foreseen from the act of erecting or maintaining the gas pipe line at the position at which it was located and consequently the plaintiff was not within the defendant’s orbit of duty.
*443The judgment entered on the verdict against South Penn Oil Company is reversed and judgment is here entered in its favor non obstante veredicto.