## Facts

- Billie Jean Andrews, a United Airlines passenger, was seriously injured when a briefcase fell from an overhead bin after the plane arrived at the gate.
- The briefcase had been stored in an overhead compartment above Andrews’s seat.
- An unidentified passenger opened the compartment after landing; the briefcase fell and struck Andrews.
- Andrews did not allege that airline employees stowed the briefcase or opened the bin.
- United’s inflight safety manager testified United had received 135 reports in a year of items falling from overhead bins.
- In response to such incidents, United added an arrival announcement warning passengers that items may have shifted and to use caution when opening bins.
- Andrews offered expert testimony that additional precautions were feasible, including installing baggage nets or limiting overhead bins to lightweight objects, without significant cost or inconvenience.
- United argued the incident rate was very low compared to total passengers and that further measures were unnecessary and burdensome.

## Issues

1. Whether, under California’s common-carrier “utmost care” standard, a reasonable jury could find United negligent for failing to take additional precautions against falling overhead-bin luggage beyond providing warnings.
2. Whether the district court improperly granted summary judgment by resolving disputed inferences about foreseeability, reasonableness, and burden of precautions.

## Decision

- The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court’s grant of summary judgment for United and remanded.
- Viewing the evidence in Andrews’s favor, the court held a reasonable jury could find falling luggage was a foreseeable risk.
- The court held a jury could conclude that warnings alone were insufficient given the carrier’s heightened duty and evidence of feasible additional safety measures.
- Because competing conclusions about reasonableness were plausible, the negligence claim could not be resolved as a matter of law on summary judgment.

## Legal Principles

- Under California law, a common carrier owes passengers a duty of utmost care and the vigilance of a very cautious person, and is responsible for even slight negligence.
- A common carrier is not an insurer of passenger safety; the duty is limited by what human care, vigilance, and foresight reasonably can do under the circumstances and the practical operation of the business.
- Summary judgment is improper where material facts or reasonable inferences about foreseeability and the reasonableness of precautions are genuinely disputable; evidence must be viewed in the nonmovant’s favor.
- Whether additional precautions are required, beyond warnings, may be a jury question when prior incidents and feasible risk-reducing measures are supported by the record.

## Conclusion

The court held that, given evidence of prior falling-item incidents and potentially low-burden preventive measures, a jury could reasonably find that an airline acting as a common carrier failed to exercise the required utmost care by relying only on warning announcements, requiring reversal of summary judgment and remand for trial proceedings.


Andrews v. United Airlines, Inc., 24 F.3d 39 (9th Cir. 1994)