## Facts

- Industrial Excess Landfill, Inc. operated a landfill, and Hybud Equipment Corporation hauled commercial and industrial waste to the site.
- Sphere Drake Insurance Company issued commercial general liability (CGL) policies covering the insureds during a period spanning roughly July 1985 to June 1987.
- The policies contained a pollution exclusion for bodily injury or property damage arising from the discharge or release of pollutants, unless the discharge was “sudden and accidental.”
- Neighboring landowners and governmental entities filed environmental actions against the insureds alleging long-term, continuous leaching and migration of hazardous substances from the landfill into surrounding soil and groundwater.
- The complaints described pollution as continuous, repeated, and progressive, rather than discrete abrupt events.
- The insureds tendered the defense to Sphere Drake; Sphere Drake denied coverage and refused to defend based on the pollution exclusion.
- The insureds sought declaratory relief and damages for defense costs; the trial court and court of appeals ruled for the insureds, construing “sudden and accidental” broadly.

## Issues

1. Whether allegations of long-term, continuous pollution fall within the “sudden and accidental” exception to a CGL pollution exclusion.
2. Whether, given the allegations in the underlying complaints, the insurer owed a duty to defend the insureds.

## Decision

- The Ohio Supreme Court reversed the judgments for the insureds.
- The court held Sphere Drake had no duty to defend because the claims alleged gradual, continuous contamination within the pollution exclusion and outside the “sudden and accidental” exception.
- The court construed “sudden” to include a temporal component (abruptness), not merely unexpectedness, and rejected the contrary appellate interpretation.

## Legal Principles

- A CGL pollution exclusion with an exception for discharges that are “sudden and accidental” is unambiguous when “sudden” is given its ordinary meaning.
- “Sudden” has a temporal meaning (happening quickly or abruptly); reading it as merely “unexpected” makes it redundant of “accidental” and weakens the exclusion.
- The duty to defend is determined by the allegations in the underlying complaints; where complaints allege only long-term, continuous pollution, the “sudden and accidental” exception is not triggered.
- Contra proferentem does not apply absent genuine ambiguity in the policy language.

## Conclusion

Because the underlying lawsuits alleged continuous, progressive environmental contamination rather than an abrupt discharge, the pollution exclusion barred coverage and Sphere Drake owed no duty to defend the insureds.


Hybud Equip. Corp. v. Sphere Drake Ins. Co., 64 Ohio St. 3d 657, 597 N.E.2d 1096 (Ohio 1992)