City of Jackson v. Brummett

• Decision Date: 13 June 1955
• Docket Number: No. 39695,39695
• Citation: 224 Miss. 501,80 So.2d 827
• Parties: CITY OF JACKSON, Mississippi, v. Mrs. Gladys Roper BRUMMETT.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

Page 827

80 So.2d 827

224 Miss. 501

CITY OF JACKSON, Mississippi, v. Mrs. Gladys Roper BRUMMETT.

No. 39695.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

June 13, 1955.

E. W. Stennett, W. T. Neely, Jackson, for appellant.

Jackson & Ross, Jackson, for appellee.

ETHRIDGE, Justice.

This is a suit against a municipality for its alleged negligence in parking and tying down an airplane at its airport, as a result of which the plane was damaged when the ropes securing it broke during a heavy wind and the plane turned over.

Appellant, City of Jackson, owns and operates the Jackson Municipal Airport, known as Hawkins Field. The City equipped, and maintains and operates the airport under the authority of Code of 1942, Sec. 7538. Appellee, Mrs. Gladys Roper Brummett, plaintiff below, owned a Cessna Model No. 170 airplane, which she parked at the airport. The manager of the airport was Bob Neblett. Neblett, acting for the City, made an oral agreement with appellee and other owners of airplanes to furnish them a parking place for their planes, to the east of the administration building, and to furnish 'tie-down service' for such planes. The jury was warranted in finding that before May 30, 1949, appellee's plane had been parked and tied down in the designated area by a city employee. This was done by the use of three ropes, one each from the right and left wings and another rope at the rear of the plane. These were tied to three u-shaped steel bars embedded in the concrete.

In the late afternoon of May 30, 1949, with very little warning, the wind increased in velocity from 7 mph to 45 mph, and, according to the U. S. Weather Bureau Station located at the airport, there were wind gusts up to 65 miles per hour. According to appellee's witnesses the ropes which had been used by appellant's employee to tie her plane down were rotten and worn-out. Appellant's evidence was to the contrary, but this made an issue for the jury. The jury was warranted in finding that as a result of the rotten and worn-out condition of the ropes, the plane was broken aloose from its moorings, and blown over and upon another plane parked nearby. None of the other seven planes parked in the immediate area and tied down by appellant was damaged, although two of the ropes were broken on one and one rope on another. There was also a conflict in the evidence as to the velocity of the wind. The jury had the right to accept the report of the U. S. Weather Bureau.

Issues properly submitted to the jury were whether appellee's husband had delivered the airplane to appellant, whether appellant's employee had parked and tied it down, and whether appellant negligently used defective ropes in tying down the plane.

Appellant argues that appellee failed to prove that she had a valid parking and tie-down contract with the City; that the agreement, if any, was oral and made with Neblett, manager of the airport; that appellee did not show...