## Facts

- A gasoline tank car derailed in a populated area of Louisville, Kentucky, causing its valve to break and gasoline to spill into the street and gutters.
- The spilled gasoline produced combustible vapors that spread through the neighborhood and into nearby homes for several hours.
- About three hours after the derailment, an explosion occurred when Charles Duerr ignited the vapors by throwing or dropping a lighted match onto the street.
- John Watson, in a nearby home, was injured when the blast nearly destroyed his house, leaving him unconscious and severely wounded.
- Watson sued multiple entities involved in ownership, transport, and track operations, alleging negligence in the tank car’s condition and in maintenance and handling of the track and derailment scene.
- Evidence conflicted on Duerr’s conduct: he claimed the match was accidentally dropped while lighting a cigar; other testimony supported an inference of an intentional attempt to ignite the gasoline.
- The trial court directed a verdict for the railroad defendants, removing the causation issue from the jury.

## Issues

1. Whether Duerr’s ignition of gasoline vapors was a superseding cause relieving the railroad of liability, or whether the railroad’s negligence could remain a proximate cause of Watson’s injuries.
2. Whether conflicting evidence about whether Duerr acted accidentally or intentionally required submission of proximate cause to the jury rather than a directed verdict.

## Decision

- The appellate court reversed the directed verdict as to the Kentucky & Indiana Bridge & Railroad Company and remanded for a new trial.
- The court held that if Duerr accidentally dropped the match while engaging in ordinary conduct, the ignition could be a foreseeable consequence of the dangerous condition and would not necessarily sever causation.
- The court held that if Duerr intentionally and maliciously ignited the gasoline, that deliberate act would be a new, independent cause that could cut off the railroad’s liability.
- Because the record allowed either inference, reasonable jurors could differ, and the trial court erred by taking the issue from the jury.

## Legal Principles

- A negligent actor is liable for injuries that are the natural and probable consequences of the negligence when the negligence sets in motion events leading to the harm in the ordinary course of things.
- An intervening act does not break proximate cause when it is a foreseeable or ordinary response to the risk created by the defendant’s negligence.
- An intervening act may become a superseding cause when it is a new, independent, and extraordinary event that the defendant could not reasonably have anticipated, including certain intentional or malicious acts.
- When evidence permits competing reasonable inferences about foreseeability and superseding cause, proximate cause is generally a question for the jury, and a directed verdict is improper.

## Conclusion

The court required a jury determination of proximate cause because liability depended on whether the third party’s ignition of gasoline vapors was an accidental, foreseeable occurrence or an intentional, independent act that would supersede any negligence by the railroad.


Watson v. Ky. & Ind. Bridge & R.R. Co., 126 S.W. 146 (Ky. Ct. App. 1910)