Fashion Model Mangled by Airplane Propeller is Among Hundreds Injured in Aviation

Lauren Scruggs

Model and fashion editor Lauren Scruggs was horribly maimed last weekend when she walked into a spinning airplane propeller. The 23-year-old beauty had just deplaned after an airborne Christmas lights tour. Propellers can rotate so fast they are invisible.

She is among the hundreds of people injured every year in aviation accidents.

Scruggs survived but lost her left hand, much of her face, and may lose vision in her left eye. She’s been unable to say what happened. If the pilot has, his statement’s not been released. It’s speculated that after deplaning and walking away from the plane, Scruggs went back towards it for some reason.

Aviation experts have weighed in on the circumstances, to the extent known. They said it’s standard and in fact critical that this plane’s engines should have been shut down and the propeller stopped, before allowing a passenger to get on or off the plane. If that were not the case, this pilot made a grievously negligent mistake.

Yet for now Scruggs’ parents say they don’t blame the pilot, who was Scruggs’ friend.

General Aviation Much More Dangerous than Commercial Aviation

According to the Department of Transportation, in 2010 general aviation saw 450 deaths, 255 serious injuries, and 1,435 accidents in close to 21 million flight hours time. That works out to 2.15 fatalities, 1.22 seriously injured persons, and 6.87 total accidents per 100,000 flight hours.

In comparison, US Air Carriers in 2010 experienced just 2 fatalities, 15 seriously injured persons and 28 total accidents in about 17.5 million flight hours. That’s just .01 fatalities, .08 seriously injured persons and .16 accidents per 100,000 flight hours.

Gerald C. Sterns

Noted aviation attorney Jerry Sterns, who’s involved in this fall’s Reno Air Disaster and the 2009 Airfrance Airbus crash, to name just two recent notorious cases, refers to the “10-10″ rule of aviation safety. “You’re 10 times safer flying a commercial air carrier than riding in a car, and you’re 10 times safer riding in a car than flying general aviation.”

Rights to Compensation for Aviation Injuries

Domestic travel. For accidents occurring in domestic air travel, domestic US law applies. Air carriers are held to a higher than normal duty of care to passengers. This is typical of all such “common carriers” or “carriers for hire.” The standard may be stated as “extraordinary care,” making it likely for passengers injured or killed in the course of travel to recover something, subject to proof of injury.

International travel. Commercial airline carriers once enjoyed limited liability for accidents in international travel, but that’s no longer the case. Since 1999, the following standards apply in international air disasters:

• Strict liability for damages up to a regularly adjusted amount, currently approximately $175,800
• Unlimited liability in the event of death or injury of passengers where the accident was caused by the carrier’s negligence
• Advance payments to the injured or the deceased’s’ survivors to meet immediate needs
• The possibility of bringing a law suit before the courts in the passenger’s principal place of residence
• The obligation for air carriers to maintain adequate insurance

Significantly, for accidents happening in international air travel subject to these rules, the burden is on the air carrier to prove it was not negligent in operating the aircraft. This is of substantial benefit to the victims or their survivors. Imagine how difficult it would be if the survivors of the Air France disaster had the burden of proof, where most of the proof lay under several thousand feet of water at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. Conversely, as Sterns notes, it was an almost impossible burden for Air France to prove it was not negligent. As it turns out, Sterns says, once the airplane’s “black boxes” were recovered, their was ample proof that Air France was very negligent. 

Aviat Husky plane similar to the one that injured Lauren Scruggs

General aviation. Accidents, injuries and deaths occurring in general aviation are governed by the ordinary law of negligence and products liability. Passengers or other victims don’t have the benefit of any burden-shifting or heightened duty of care. Neither though do owners, operators, and others connected with general aviation have have any restrictions or limits to liability. They are fully exposed to damages attributable to their conduct.

The primary cause of risk in general aviation is the pilot, specifically inexperienced pilots.

“It’s called the ‘Kennedy Window.’” Sterns is speaking of new pilots in the “window” of 200-400 hours of flight time. It’s an explicit reference to John F. Kennedy, Jr., who piloted himself, his wife and sister-in-law to their deaths in a Martha’s Vineyard haze. ”They have sufficient experience and skill to operate the aircraft, take off, fly and land. They also have a sense of confidence built up with these hours.” Yet he explains they lack the judgment that comes with added experience, and their unfounded confidence leads them to take unwarranted risks, like trying to beat advancing bad weather, or attempting to fly in marginal conditions.

In all aviation accidents, whether in general or commercial aviation, the manufacturers and suppliers of the equipment that caused the crash may be liable under ordinary products liability principles. This is extremely important for victims in all cases because often the carrier, and almost always the general aviation pilot or plane owner, won’t have the “deep pockets” sufficient to fund the very large damages aviation accidents can cause.

As Sterns also points out, in the case of general aviation especially, insurance coverage will be very limited. “The typical general aviation liability policy,” he says, “limits coverage to $ 100,000 per passenger.” This makes it imperative to fully investigate the liability of potential other parties in a case, including the airport.

A look at some recent awards in aviation cases just underscores the obvious, that aviation accidents will leave some very large personal injury and wrongful death holes to fill.

Aviation Accidents Settlements and Awards

Most aviation injury cases settle out of court, and most of those settlements are confidential. Here are some reported verdicts and settlements in aviation death cases from the last five years:

• $ 88.7 million jury verdict, including $64 million in punitive damages, for three killed and one survivor in of a crashed caused by a defective Piper Cherokee aircraft engine
• $ 48 million jury verdict, consisting of $ 20,000,000 for compensatory damages ($ 4,000,000 per Plaintiff) and $ 28,000,000 for punitive damages for four passengers and a pilot killed in the crash of a skydiving plane caused by defective engine turbine compressor blades
• $ 6.8 million wrongful death verdict for man killed on the tarmac by the explosive decompression of an Hawker Beechcraft B200 King Air door
• $ 5.6 million for a flight nurse killed when a helicopter rotor broke on takeoff, causing the helicopter to crash and burn
• $ 2.5 million wrongful death settlement for 60-year-old co-pilot killed in a crash allegedly caused by negligent maintenance by the plane’s owner/operator
• $ 1.786 million for 42-year-old passenger killed when his helicopter pilot, who was not instrument-certified, flew into a fog bank and crashed the copter.
• $ 1.675 million for an almond farmer  killed by an engine malfunction on a crop-dusting flight
• $ 507,031.25 settlement with the Bell Helicopter Company and a maintenance company for a helicopter pilot killed in a crash

Art Buono is a news reporter for the Lawyers.com blog.

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