Ranzier v. Monongahela River Consolidated Coal & Coke Co.

Citations

• 247 Pa. 420
• 93 A. 501
• 1915 Pa. LEXIS 854

Syllabus

<p>Negligence — Mines and mining — Master and servant — Employee —Operation of motor — Walking on tracks — Duty to look — Contributory negligence — Judgment non obstante veredicto.</p> <p>1. It is the duty of an. employee working in a mine to look before going in a place of danger. Where he steps in front of a moving car without looking for the danger that immediately confronted him, he is guilty of contributory negligence unless there is something in the circumstances to absolve him from the duty to look.</p> <p>2. In an action against a mining company to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by a seventeen year old boy who had been employed in defendant’s mine for a period of a year, the court did not err in holding the plaintiff guilty of contributory negligence and in entering judgment for defendant non obstante veredicto, where it appeared that on the evening of the accident the plaintiff and two other workmen were leaving the mine by way of a parting on which were located two tracks, owing to an obstruction in the traveling-way used as a usual means of exit; that while they were walking along, two trains, one on each track, were started in opposite directions, and the plaintiff and his companions were compelled to stop between the tracks in a space of two feet where they remained standing until one of the trains had passed, there being apparently no other place of safety; that immediately on the passing of the last ear of the out-bound train, according to the plaintiff’s testimony, he stepped upon the track upon which the train had just passed and was instantly struck by a motor car which was being hauled with the train, and which was connected with the last car by a rope; that the driver, who sat on the front end of the motor, had a lighted lamp in his cap, and that the plaintiff and his two companions who stood beside him, had lighted lamps in their caps, furnishing sufficient light for the plaintiff to have seen the approaching ear had he stopped