## Facts

- Two neighboring farmers brought separate actions against an oil-refinery operator; the cases were heard together because they raised the same legal questions.
- One plaintiff owned and occupied a 57-acre farm with a dwelling and farm buildings and relied on a well for drinking water and a stream for livestock water.
- The defendant owned higher-elevation land across a highway and operated an oil refinery and storage tanks for petroleum products.
- The plaintiffs alleged the defendant allowed petroleum waste and polluted waters to collect on its land and in basins and ponds, impregnating and polluting those areas.
- The plaintiffs claimed polluted substances and waters escaped through percolations under and through the defendant’s land and beneath the highway onto the plaintiffs’ farm, contaminating the well and stream.
- The plaintiffs alleged the well and stream became unfit for use, requiring off-site water acquisition.
- The plaintiffs further alleged substantial livestock losses (hogs and hens) from drinking the contaminated water.
- The pleadings were framed as trespass on the case for causing a nuisance and did not allege negligence, lack of skill, or intentional diversion.

## Issues

1. Whether allegations that petroleum waste migrated by unknown subterranean percolation to contaminate a neighbor’s well and stream state a nuisance claim absent negligence, intent, or invasion of a recognized legal right.
2. Whether the jurisdiction should impose strict (absolute) liability for the escape of dangerous substances onto another’s land.

## Decision

- The supreme court overruled the plaintiffs’ exceptions and affirmed the sustaining of the defendant’s demurrers.
- The court held the declarations failed to state a cause of action in nuisance because they did not allege negligence, intentional conduct, or violation of a recognized legal right.
- The court declined to adopt the strict-liability rule associated with *Rylands v. Fletcher* for escape of hazardous substances.
- Harm resulting from contamination of unknown percolating subterranean waters through non-negligent refinery operations was treated as damnum absque injuria.

## Legal Principles

- A nuisance claim requires an invasion of a legally protected right; alleging harm alone does not establish liability.
- Rights in subterranean/percolating waters are limited; liability arises where such waters are purposely or negligently diverted (or otherwise where a recognized legal right is invaded).
- Strict liability for keeping substances likely to cause harm if they escape is not recognized under this jurisdiction’s law.
- Where industrial activity causes injury through contamination of percolating waters whose courses are not known, and the pleadings do not allege negligence, lack of skill, or invasion of a recognized legal right, the injury is not actionable as a matter of public policy.

## Conclusion

The court held that contamination reaching neighboring land through unknown percolating subterranean waters does not support nuisance liability without pleaded fault or invasion of a recognized legal right, and it rejected strict liability for the escape of hazardous substances, leaving the plaintiffs without a remedy on the pleaded theory.


Rose v. Socony-Vacuum Corp., 54 R.I. 411, 173 A. 627 (R.I. 1934)