Dr. Lawrence E. "Larry" Thibault
Dr. Thibault, a former Chairman of the School of Bioengineering at the University of Pennsylvania, and founded Biomechanics, Inc. at Exton Pennsylvania. As Biomechanics Inc. he represented many propeller accident victims or their survivors. Read More→
Michael Hinton was trying to retrieve his son’s hat which had blown into the water on September 10, 2000. He was on the swim deck, crouched, hanging onto the swim ladder and getting ready to reach for the hat. The swim ladder was anchored to the transom by a nylon strap through a grommet. The grommet broke and Hinton fell in, went under a few seconds, then surfaced several yards away.
The boat operator backed up to retrieve Mr. Hinton, he swam toward the stern, as Mr. Hinton looked up he saw the boat rapidly approaching, hit his chin on the swim platform, one of his legs was pulled into the propeller and severely injured, and later amputated.
Michael Hinton claims the boat had a defective swim ladder.
As noted above, the trial focused on the ladder, but they would not have had a trial is he had not been injured by the propeller.
The Jury decided in favor of OMC on February 2, 2012. Read More→
Deondra Scott was swimming behind a rented boat at North Carolina’s annual Lake Norman Lake Bash on June 25, 2011. A novice operator backed over her, then went forward over her striking her twice with the Chaparral boat’s propeller. Scott filed suit against the boat operator (Dennis Allen), the boat rental operation (David Orzolek), and the boat builder (Chaparral Boats).
Deondra L. Scott v. Dennis F. Allen, David D. Orzolek, and Chaparral Boats, Inc. was filed on January 3, 2012 in the General Court of Justice Superior Court Division, County of Mecklenburg, North Carolina. Read More→
A young boy, David Paul McFarlin, was killed in a May 31, 2010 Storm Lake Iowa boating accident. A Labor Day boat outing on Storm Lake became a tragedy when their 175 horsepower Mercury Marine outboard motor struck a submerged dredge pipe on Storm Lake, the Mercury outboard flipped backwards into the boat, and David Paul McFarlin, a ten years old boy, was killed by its propeller.
The full title of the case is:
Estate of David Paul McFarlin, by its Personal Representative, Jamie Laass, Jamie Laass individually; and Jamie Laass, as parent and next friend of S.L. vs. City of Storm Lake, and Iowa Municipal Corporation, Buena Vista County, and Iowa municipal corporation, Lake Improvement Commission, an Iowa Chapter 28E organization, Brunswick Corporation, a Delaware corporation, dba Mercury Marine and Lund Boat Company, Harry Foote, Randy Redig, Russell Harrington, and David Botine.
Justia titles the case as Laass, et al vs. City of Storm Lake, et al
Jamie Laass is the boy’s mother, Harry Foote was operating the boat, Redig, Harrington, and Botine are the dredging defendants.
Brunswick (Mercury Marine and Lund) is being sued for negligent design and warnings. The case is in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Iowa Western Division. Read More→
Mercury Marine Tiller Outboards
Our Mercury Marine Tells Court the McGarrigil Accident is the First One Involving Mercury Tiller Steered Outboards post defines exactly what Mercury Marine said. Read More→
In McGarrigle v. Mercury Marine, a propeller / kill switch case, Mercury Marine claims John McGarrigle is the the first person NOT using a kill switch to be injured by a Mercury Marine tiller steered outboard.
We find that hard to believe, but before we can prove them wrong, we need to determine exactly what Mercury Marine’s legal team said.
On page 8 of the 20 December 2011 Partial Summary Judgement Opinion by the Court, (document 41 in the U.S. District Court New Jersey case docket), the court restates Mercury’s position:
Defendant argues that Dr. Fisher should not be permitted to testify that the design of the outboard engine was and is defective because it does not incorporate a lanyard A type stop switch. Defendant states that between 1986 and July 2007, it sold more than 750,000 8 to 25 horsepower outboard engines that use the lanyard B. It also states that, other than plaintiff’s accident, it is aware of no other accidents of a scenario similar to plaintiff’s, which resulted in propeller strike injuries to an ejected operator of a small hand-tilled outboard engine who did not use the lanyard B.
For basic information on John McGarrigle and Barbara McGarrigle v. Mercury Marine in U.S. District Court, D. New Jersey, see our McGarrigle v. Mercury Marine case page.
Very briefly, John McGarrigle fell from a small boat when it hit a wave, was not wearing a lanyard kill switch, the boat circled repeatedly, he tried to re-board it, and was struck by the propeller.
Both sides moved for summary judgement on some issues prior to the trial. Both sides won some issues and lost some issues. The full opinion written by Disrict Judge Noel L. Hillman is available on Leagle.com.
The defense tried to block Kenneth W. Fisher from being an expert witness for the plaintiff. They said he was not an expert in this field (kill switches on small boats) under Daubert. They also do not want to allow Dr. Fisher or others to use U.S. Coast Guard Navigational and Vessel Inspection Circular No. 4-89 (Circular 4-89). Defense claims Circular 4-89 only applies to commercial vessels. Defense also wants to prevent Dr. Fisher or others from using American Society of Testing and Materials (ASTM) F 1166-07 standard regarding human factors engineering (they grant it refers to ships and marine structures, but claim it does not specifically mention recreational boats).
In a 20 December 2011 opinion, the court said Dr. Fisher will be allowed to testify and he can use ASTM F 1166-07, but he will not be allowed to use Circular 4-89.
At the same time, Plaintiffs moved for summary judgement to prevent Defense from being able to claim the accident was caused by the victim taking a small boat out in choppy water and going too fast, they also wanted to block evidence of his behavior after being ejected (tired to re-board the circling boat), and wanted to block evidence that neither Mr Garrigle or his father read the outboard owners manual.
In the same 20 December 2011 opinion, the court said the defense would be allowed to present evidence of a proximate cause of the accident being the condition of the water and the speed of the boat. Defense will also be allowed to discuss the victim’s attempts to re-board the circling boat. The defense will not be able to introduce the failure of Mr. Garrigle or his father to read the owners manual as evidence of comparative fault or as a proximate cause because the defendant acknowledges some people operate their outboards without reading the manual, and thus it was foreseeable. Read More→
John McGarrigle and Barbara McGarrigle v. Mercury Marine. Civil Action No. 09-4625. United States District Court, D. New Jersey.
Saturday, July 21, 2007, 37 year old John McGarrigle, of Pennsylvania, was operating a 12 foot aluminum fishing boat on Delaware Bay near Seabreeze, New Jersey about 5:20pm by himself. The small tiller steered boat, belonging to his father, was powered by a 2001 15 horsepower Mercury Marine outboard motor. The water was choppy, John was not wearing a lanyard kill switch. He was pitched overboard, the boat went into the “Circle of Death”, he tried to grab and re-board the spinning boat, and was struck by the propeller. John received severe injuries to his head and neck. A bystander on shore, swam out 100 to 150 feet and kept him afloat till more help could arrive. The prop strike victim was brought to shore in another boat and life flighted to an area hospital. The Coast Guard was able to stop the still circling boat by using a rope to foul its propeller. (Accident description was assembled from court records and several newspaper accounts.)
A New Jersey Patrol Officer interviewed the victim about a month later. The victim reported he had been going about 15 miles per hour, hit a wave, and was ejected. The same officer had responded to the accident. The patrol officer logged the accident as being caused by “excessive speed”, but testified he had no actual knowledge of the victim’s speed. Read More→
We recently completed our Developing a Consumer Guide for the Selection of Propeller Guards and Other Propeller Safety Devices post. Part of that project involved creating our Propeller Accident Risk Worksheet. In that worksheet we identify five categories of Propeller Accident Risk:
We started thinking about how we could calculate an the actual risk of a given boat (or the people with that boat) being involved in propeller accident and quickly realized that if all the risks were really contained within the five categories we identified (or if we were in a perfect world and were able to identify all the categories of risk and the risk of each category), the risk of a given boat being involved in a propeller accident during a year could be calculated something similar to: Read More→
This post is part of our coverage of the Listman v. OMC propeller injury trial
Robin Listman vs. Outboard Marine Corporation
Second Judicial District Court of the State of Nevada, County of Washoe
1 November 2011 Session One – pm (Note there was no morning session, this was an afternoon session per CVN) Read More→