INJURED BY ACID
DAMAGES AWARDED IN THE iIOSOWAI CASE. The in formation has been received thai I the heavy claims made by ivo whart i labourers for injuries received througn I an effusion of sulphuric acid from a drum which was ueing unloaded from the ilonowai at Auckland have been ! successful. The accident occurred on ] September 7, 1916, and thirteen men were injured, but some of them only slightly. Others were less fortunate, and three of them-Churles Faulkiner (53), James Coutts (51), and Henry Barnes (50)-had their eyesight completely destroyed, while i two others—George Jones (42) and iuomas Anderson (09)— were obliged to remain in hospital for months owing to I the severity of their injuries. The accident u-ns subsequently made the subject of inquiry 'by a Hoyal Commission, of ivhich Mr. Kettle, S.M., was the chairman. The rubber nlng used as a eorU wns condemned by the commission, which ascribed the accident to it. As the men were injured in the course of thoirQmployinent l,y the Union Steam Ship Company, they mere entitled to payment by that company under the Workers' Compensation Act, and the coinpnny immediately proceeded to make the weekly payments prescribed b.v the Act. The Act, however, docs not take away the right of an injured man to brhia an action at common low claiming damages, and accordingly the five men above mentioned commenced an action iu Melbourne, claiming damages from the shippers of the acid, Messrs. Koseiimiin and Co., and their agents, the Wiseher •Proprietary, Ltd., by whom the drum had boon filled with the fluid. After the writs had been issued, Mr. Rosenhain died, and the actions abated so far "xs he was concerned, but they proceeded ■against the defendant company. In December last a commission, on the apyli--1 ration of the plaintiffs, issued out of the Supreme Court of Victoria for the purpose of taking evidence at Auckland, and under that commission some twentyfivn witnesses were examined. The five actions; were consolidated pursuant to the procedure umi.il in such a case, and were ordered to be tried ae one action. The following were the amounte claimed:—Charles Vaulkiner, .£2500; James Coutts, .C25(IO; 11. Barnes, J!2fl00; George Jones, .£1000; and T. Anderson, .£3011; making n total of JJS3OO. Mv. V. J. O'Rpgan, of Wellington, 'anpeared for the injured lnpn before the Royal Commission, and it was in pccordnncc with his iidvicfi that prneciyliiijis for damages were instituted in Melbourne. Mr. O'Regan went to Melbourne for I the hearing of the case, and a cablegram ! from him announces that the jury has I awarded damages totalling .£6850.
Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/DOM19180503.2.42
Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka
Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 192, 3 May 1918, Page 6
Word count
Tapeke kupu
431INJURED BY ACID Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 192, 3 May 1918, Page 6
Using this item
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
Stuff Ltd is the copyright owner for the Dominion. You can reproduce in-copyright material from this newspaper for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). This newspaper is not available for commercial use without the consent of Stuff Ltd. For advice on reproduction of out-of-copyright material from this newspaper, please refer to the Copyright guide.