McGahan v. The Indianapolis Natural Gas Company

• Decision Date: 29 May 1894
• Docket Number: 16,823
• Citation: 37 N.E. 601,140 Ind. 335
• Parties: McGahan v. The Indianapolis Natural Gas Company
• Court: Indiana Supreme Court

37 N.E. 601

140 Ind. 335

McGahan v. The Indianapolis Natural Gas Company

No. 16,823

Supreme Court of Indiana

May 29, 1894

Petition for a Rehearing Overruled Feb. 8, 1895.

From the Marion Circuit Court.

The judgment is affirmed.

S. M Shepard and J. P. Baker, for appellant.

W. H H. Miller, F. Winter and J. B. Elam, for appellee.

OPINION

Hackney, C. J.

This action was by the appellant, and by it he sought to recover damages for personal injuries resulting from an explosion of natural gas. The complaint was in two paragraphs, to each of which the lower court sustained the appellee's demurrer, and that ruling is the only assigned error. The material facts alleged were that the appellee was engaged in supplying natural gas, for fuel and other purposes, to the citizens of the city of Indianapolis; that a tenement occupied by one Kilburn was supplied with natural gas by said company, through a service pipe of said company extending from its mains to the property line, and there connecting by a valve, with the pipes of said tenement; that said tenant discovered that the gas was escaping from the pipes upon said premises, and after passing through said valve; that she employed the appellant, an experienced plumber, to locate and remedy the defect in the pipes which permitted the gas to so escape; that said valve was for the purpose, and was the only means, of cutting off the supply of gas from the appellee's mains to said premises, and it was under the exclusive control of the appellee; that to repair said defect it became necessary to have said supply of gas cut off, and for that purpose the appellee was repeatedly requested, and promised, to have said valve turned without delay, but, through the negligence of said company, and its incompetent servants, said valve was not so turned, and said gas continued to escape within said tenement for more than twenty-four hours; that during that period, and while upon a second visit to said premises, the appellant was engaged in searching for said defect, and while so engaged said natural gas, then being inflammable and liable to explode, did explode with such violence as to produce the injuries complained of.

It is also alleged that appellant was free from contributory negligence, and that the appellee knew of the dangerous character of said natural gas, but there is no allegation as to the cause of such explosion, nor that the gas would have exploded without some intervening agency.

That it was negligence to omit to turn off the gas from said premises when so requested, is not controverted, and we do not decide, but it is insisted that this alleged negligence was not the proximate cause of the injury, and that the specific facts pleaded disclose the negligence of the appellant contributing to the injury.

That the injury complained of must appear, from the facts alleged to have been the proximate result of the appellee's negligence, is not questioned by the appellant, but it is argued that the injury resulted proximately from the failure to turn the gas from said premises. It is said that "had not the appellee been guilty of the negligence alleged, the injuries to the appellant would not have happened." This argument is not tenable, since it can be said, with equal propriety, that the injury would not have been sustained if the appellant had not undertaken the known dangerous experiment of searching for the defect while the gas was flowing into the pipes of the tenement. But we can say, as a matter of common knowledge, that the injury was not due to spontaneous combustion, and that it was impossible without some agency acting upon the leaking gas; therefore, we can say...