## Facts

- Ball-Foster Glass Container Co. (then Saint-Gobain) operated a glass-container plant in Seattle and periodically rebuilt furnaces using traveling firebrick masons.
- Alfred Giovanelli, a Pennsylvania resident, had worked exclusively on Saint-Gobain rebuild projects for years and routinely traveled nationwide for multi-week assignments.
- For a 2001 Seattle furnace rebuild, Giovanelli was recruited as a foreman through a contractor (Sonny Champ Refractories) consistent with a collective bargaining arrangement.
- Giovanelli and other masons were placed on the Seattle plant’s payroll as Washington employees, with Washington deductions taken from their pay.
- The employer paid Giovanelli’s transportation to and from Seattle, paid wages for travel time, and provided a daily per diem for the entire stay, including nonworking days.
- On a Sunday off, Giovanelli left his hotel to walk to a nearby park for music and was struck by a car while crossing the street in front of the hotel, resulting in permanent blindness.
- The Washington Department of Labor and Industries allowed the workers’ compensation claim; the Board of Industrial Insurance Appeals, superior court, and court of appeals affirmed.

## Issues

1. Whether an out-of-state worker temporarily assigned to Washington was covered by Washington’s Industrial Insurance Act as an employee in Washington.
2. Whether a traveling employee injured during off-duty hours while engaged in ordinary personal activity near lodging is injured “in the course of employment.”
3. Whether the worker’s outing constituted a distinct personal deviation that removed him from the course of employment.

## Decision

- The Washington Supreme Court affirmed the allowance of benefits.
- The court held Giovanelli was covered by the Industrial Insurance Act as a Washington employee for the assignment.
- The court held Giovanelli was a traveling employee whose course of employment continued during the trip, covering reasonable activities incident to living away from home.
- The court concluded that walking from the hotel to a nearby park for recreation on a day off was a reasonable activity and not a distinct personal departure.

## Legal Principles

- Washington’s Industrial Insurance Act is remedial and is construed liberally to provide sure and certain relief for work-related injuries.
- Under the traveling employee doctrine, when work requires travel, the employee remains in the course of employment continuously during the trip, except for a distinct departure on a personal errand.
- For traveling employees, reasonable activities incident to required travel and temporary lodging (including ordinary recreation near the lodging) can fall within the course of employment.
- Employer payment and structuring of travel and living arrangements (travel expenses, paid travel time, per diem) support traveling-employee status and continuous coverage.

## Conclusion

The court held that an out-of-state worker temporarily working in Washington was covered by Washington workers’ compensation and, as a traveling employee, remained in the course of employment while engaging in reasonable off-duty activity near his lodging; his injury was therefore compensable.


Ball-Foster Glass Container Co. v. Giovanelli, 177 P.3d 692 (Wash. 2008)