4-County Elec. Power Ass'n v. Clardy

• Decision Date: 14 June 1954
• Docket Number: No. 39244,39244
• Citation: 73 So.2d 144,44 A.L.R.2d 1191,221 Miss. 403
• Parties: , 44 A.L.R.2d 1191 4-COUNTY ELECTRIC POWER ASS'N v. CLARDY.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

Page 144

73 So.2d 144

221 Miss. 403, 44 A.L.R.2d 1191

4-COUNTY ELECTRIC POWER ASS'N v. CLARDY.

No. 39244.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

June 14, 1954.

Snow & Covington, Meridian, for appellant.

Roger C. Landrum, Columbus, Strong & Smith, Louisville, L. W. Brown, Starkville, for appellee.

ETHRIDGE, Justice.

Appellee, George Clayton Clardy, initiated this suit in the Circuit Court of Winston County against appellant, 4--County Electric Power Assocition. It was for damages for personal injuries received by Clardy, a well driller and repairer, when he came in contact with appellant's high powered electric line located over a well. The jury returned a verdict of $75,000 for appellee, and from the judgment based on that verdict this appeal was taken.

Appellant is a corporation domiciled at Starkville, Oktibbeha County, Mississippi, and is engaged in the business of operating high powered electric transmission lines and selling electricity to its members in seven counties. Its principal office is in Columbus, Lowndes County. In 1944 appellant bought an easement across the farm land involved in this case, which will be called the Regenold Farm, located in Lowndes County. Appellant was authorized to construct and operate an electric distribution or transmission system on this property. The easement deed did not describe any particular location for the line. This was left in the discretion of appellant, the instrument stating, 'it is understood * * * that the location of the poles will be such as to form the least possible interference to farm operations, so long as it does not materially increase the cost of construction.'

Appellant afterwards constructed on the Regenold Farm its electric transmission line, carrying 7200 volts, which terminated at a pole approximately 140 feet southeast of the residence on that farm, and 34 feet 9 inches southeast of the well. From this pole, upon which there was a transformer, low voltage insulated wires were run to the residence in order to supply it with electricity. Low voltage insulated wires were strung from the residence to a pole located a few feet from the deep water well situated near the house, and the same type of wires was strung from that pole to an electric pump on the well. This well was from 300 to 400 feet in depth, and was used to supply the landowner with water for his home and stock. The well did not have a pump house over it. The electric pump was exposed on top of the concrete foundation over the well, which was one foot thick and about four feet square. Two wires lead to this pole, which dead-ended the transmission line on the Regenold Farm. The pole was 30 feet in height. The high powered line to this pole was made of uninsulated copper wire, which had turned black by exposure to the weather.

Some time after appellant's transmission line had been constructed on the Regenold farm and dead-ended there, an adjoining landowner desired electricity for his place also, so appellant then extended its transmission line from the terminal pole on the Regenold farm to the new customer in order to serve his place. When appellant made this extension of service, it continued in a northwestern direction its high voltage, uninsulated transmission line, at a height of approximately 25 feet above the ground and approximately eighteen inches west of a perpendicular plane from the well. In other words, the wire lacked only eighteen inches of being directly over the center of the well and was approximately 25 feet above the ground. This transmission line also had a lower, neutral wire which did not carry electricity and which was about three and one-half feet below the primary line which carried 7200 volts. Apparently appellant's high powered transmission line had been over the well for several years when appellee was injured in 1951.

This well was from 300 to 400 feet in depth, which was a customary depth. Many wells have electric pumps on them and like the present one usually contain several sections of pipe of 21 feet in length, extending from the pump down to the water under the ground. These sections of two-inch pipe were each 21 feet in length, and located inside the two-inch pipe was a smaller pipe or rod serving as a pump rod, which was in sections varying from 18 to 21 feet. Attached to the pump rod was a cylinder.

There were two methods used in this territory for repairing a well. One was by hand, where the repairmen would remove the pipe manually. They would pull the pipe out of the well in sections, up to where the joints were at approximately waist level. With wrenches they would then unscrew the sections of pipe one at a time. Since the joints of the inside pump rod would not usually be at exactly the same place as the joints on the larger pipe, it ordinarily was necessary to elevate the 21-foot sections of the two-inch pipe somewhat higher than waist level in order to unscrew the pump rod inside of it. And this process would raise the pipe sections over 25 feet in the air.

The other customary method of repairing wells in this area was by the use of a derrick. Appellee, George Clardy, and his brother, Walter Clardy, were well drillers and repairers, doing business as Clardy Brothers. Appellee, at the time of the accident, was 22 years of age, and helped his brother Walter in this business. Walter, who was 24, apparently was the leader and the one who was more familiar with this type of work. Walter Clardy and appellee owned a derrick which was erected upon the rear of a truck. Their derrick was 30 feet in height, at the top of which was a pulley. This derrick-ladder was in two sections, which lay prone upon the truck until extended by a motor. After it was extended, it was necessary for someone to climb up on the derrick and attach metal braces to each side of the ladder. A rope would be then run through the pulley at the top of the derrick. The rope connected to the pulley is used to pull the pipe from the ground by sections, disconnecting each section when the joints are raised above the ground to a point where they can be conveniently unscrewed.

In the early part of 1951 Mrs. S. A. Regenold bought the farm in Lowndes County previously referred to and over which appellant's high powered transmission line ran, crossing almost directly over the well. Mr. Regenold was managing the farm for his wife. On March 6, 1951, he talked to Walter Clardy and appellee George Clardy about repairing the well. Regenold said that Walter told him they would have to see the well, so he, Walter Clardy and appellee drove out to the farm in Regenold's car. Walter and appellee looked at the exposed part of the well. Regenold testified that in the presence of appellee, Walter Clardy told Regenold that he would have to pull the pipe in the well to find out what repairs were needed before he could give Regenold a price for the job; and that Walter also looked up at the wires above the well and said that he would have to see 'if the rig will clear those wires.' Appellee denied that any such statements were made. He stated that he saw the wires above the well and knew they were electric wires, but he thought that they were low voltage, insulated 'house wires' like the others running from the pole near the well. Appellee testified, as did Regenold and several other witnesses, including two electrical engineers from the University of Alabama, that the copper wires in the transmission line had turned black from long exposure to the weather, and that one looking at them could not tell the difference between them and the insulated, low voltage wires running from the pole near the well. There was some dispute on this question, but the great weight of the evidence supported the jury's manifest finding that both types of wires looked almost exactly alike.

After George and Walter Clardy had looked at the exposed part of the well with Regenold, they left and Regenold went out into his pasture to do some work. In the meantime the Clardys returned with their truck upon which the well derrick, made of metal, was situated. Appellee started taking apart the old pump on top of the concrete block over the well. Walter Clardy backed the truck up to the edge of the well, with the derrick immediately over it. He and appellee then raised the derrick, and appellee facing the rear of the truck climbed up the ladder of the derrick, for the purpose of bolting a long metal brace onto each side of the ladder. Approximately eighteen inches to two feet away from appellee's left side was the high powered transmission wire. Appellee reached around the derrick with his right hand, and with that hand was holding the left side of the derrick, together with a bolt on the left side which extended to the exterior of the ladder. He was undertaking with his left hand to screw the nut onto the bolt on the left side of the ladder, when in some unascertained way the electricity entered appellee's body, burning him severely and knocking him off the derrick. He fell 25 feet to the ground. Appellee testified, 'some way, I don't know, the derrick could have swayed or the wind could have blowed the wires a lot, anyway the wire burned me.' Appellee wore on his left wrist a wrist watch with a metal band. Among his injuries was a terribly burned indentation all around that wrist, which practically disabled his left forearm and hand. So the electricity could have reached appellee by arcing to the metal wristband, or the derrick could have swayed slightly, or the wind could have blown the line. At any rate, when the 7200 volts entered appellee's body, his head was thrown against the wire, because on the left side of his head there is a deep scar around four inches in length, which destroyed at that point the scalp and part of the cranial bone.

Appellee testified that he understood very little about electricity, but that he knew that it would hurt him under certain conditions. He had never done any electrical work or...