Conner v. Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railway Co.

123 N.W. 533, 158 Mich. 688, 1909 Mich. LEXIS 777
CourtMichigan Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 10, 1909
DocketDocket No. 107
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 123 N.W. 533 (Conner v. Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railway Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Michigan Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Conner v. Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Railway Co., 123 N.W. 533, 158 Mich. 688, 1909 Mich. LEXIS 777 (Mich. 1909).

Opinions

Brooke, J.

This is an action to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by the plaintiff on March 14, 1904, while assisting in turning an engine on defendant’s turntable located at Adrian. Plaintiff had been in defendant’s employ since 1888, first as a carpenter, then in the waterworks department, and finally, for the four years preceding his injury, as machinist, making general repairs on locomotives in the roundhouse. The turntable connected with the roundhouse had for years been difficult to [689]*689operate because of the fact that it had been built to carry lighter engines than those in use on the defendant company’s lines at the time of the injury to plaintiff. This extra weight had a tendency to press downward the ends of the table, causing the small wheels under each end to rest heavily on the circular rail inside the pit and sometimes to bind. When this situation developed, and it appears to have done so every day and sometimes many times each day, it was the custom of the hostler and his helper to call to their aid other employés in and about the roundhouse, including plaintiff. He testifies that, during all the time he worked in the roundhouse, it was customary for him to help in turning engines when called upon; that he understood the mechanism of the table, and was as familiar as anybody with its operation and surroundings, including the approaching tracks. In the fall preceding, the table had been repaired and strengthened. In this process its surface was raised to a height of about four inches above the connecting rails leading to it. These connecting rails were thereupon raised up to the proper level; but no additional ballast was at that time placed between them. The depression caused by the lifting of the approaching tracks was soon filled, however, with snow thrown from the pit and with cinders from the engine smokestacks. So long as the weather remained cold, this operated as well as if it had been properly ballasted. In March, shortly before the plaintiff was injured, warm weather came on, causing the ice and snow to melt. This left in places between the rails depressions about four inches lower than the bottom of the rail. A push-bar was attached to either end of the table at a proper height for the men to push upon and long enough so that two, three, or even four, might reach it. In turning engine No. 50 (the one which caused the injury), it was necessary to so place it upon the table that the pilot extended about its entire length beyond the edge of the table and alongside the push-bar at that end of the [690]*690table. This left but a narrow space between the pilot and the push-bar. In turning the engine in one direction, the men would stand between the push-bar and the projecting pilot, and, as the table revolved, the pilot would follow along behind the men in close proximity to their heels. In turning it in the other direction, the push-bar would be between the men and the pilot; the pilot swinging around in front of the pushing men.

The plaintiff described the accident as follows:

“ On this night in question, I was called out to help on this turntable. It was in the evening, after dark. It was a dark night. There wasn’t any lights around the turntable. They had engine 50 on the turntable. The trouble was they couldn’t turn the engine; but the causes for the trouble was sometimes one thing and sometimes another. The causes that time was they couldn’t turn the engine; but generally the trouble would be — that is, it would sometimes, in balancing these engines on the turntable, they — the condition that the turntable was left in. We would run an engine on the turntable and balance it, and by — as soon as we would have it balanced, why, the pilot would come down on top of the approaching rails to the turntable and stick, so that we couldn’t move it. It was rigid and fast. We would then be obliged to back the engine up far enough to raise the pilot above the rails so that it would swing out over, back it back on to the end, and throw the weight on one end, and then it was almost impossible for us to turn it at all. Sometimes we would and sometimes we wouldn’t, and sometimes we’d get them balanced so that they wouldn’t — the pilot would happen to be a little higher, and it wouldn’t hit the rails, then it would hit high places in the circular rail. The engine would bear down so heavy on the circle rail that it would tighten on that end and be impossible to turn it. There were various causes that— When I got out there that night, the pilot of the engine was headed towards the roundhouse. It was standing about northwest. The pilot was overreaching the turntable just as far as it could and keep the wheels on the table. The pilot would probably extend about 5, 5£ feet over these tracks on the outside. It would depend somewhat on the length of the pilot. There were various lengths of the pilot. That engine had a long pilot, I should judge 5 or 5£ feet [691]*691long. If I recollect right, the engine was stuck so that you could (not) move it, and we moved it back to the south a ways to get a kind of run on it. It was necessary most of the time to get speed on it with what help we had to get around with it. We would get started and strike those rails, and we couldn’t get around with it, and it was necessary to put speed on. We would move it as fast as we could, and that would help it over these bad places. I had hold of this push-bar inside next to the turntable pit. We were on the northwest corner of the table. That is where we were pushing. I was standing in between the engine and the handle. I had hold of the handle. It was about 3\ feet, probably, above the top of the rails. Frank Beyer had hold of the bar withme. I don’t know for sure who were at the other push-bar, at the other end of the table; but I think there were four men at the end that I was on. There was one man with me; the other two being behind the pilot. I don’t remember who they were; that is, there was the hostler’s helper, if I remember right, and the other was a man that worked in the roundhouse that night. After we got the engine pushed back south, we started it toward the north again. We weren’t going very fast, maybe at the beginning as fast as a man would walk. Sometimes you would have to reach quite a ways to get a step, and sometimes you wouldn’t. Your steps were a good deal as you could get them.

“Q. Yes. Well, now, as you were going around to the east and pushing on that bar, just tell the jury what took place.

“A. Well, I — the pilot caught my foot, and—

“Q. Well, now, just how did that — now, how were you caught, and where were you caught ?

“A. Well, I was leaning forward at an angle, probably about 45, pushing on this bar, and stepping along over the rails, and the pilot was swinging right around close to the top of the rails, swinging right around after me, and I stepped over a rail onto the ground, and the pilot — I didn’t step away quick enough so but what the pilot — come right on top of my foot, my right foot, up above my heel a little ways, and as it was coming along I hung onto this bar. As the pilot was pushing me along, I hung onto this bar, . and I put my left foot right back of me onto the pilot, and as it turned a little bit it turned my foot so that it broke loose, and I pulled it out; that is, I pulled it as the engine kept a going. And I think we came to a stop after I got [692]*692out; but I couldn’t say, as the engine stopped going, but I — when I was fast I called to the fellows to stop, hollered, ‘My foot is fast,’ and of course I was trying to get out, and X—

“Q.

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Related

Lukovski v. Michigan Central Railroad
129 N.W. 707 (Michigan Supreme Court, 1911)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
123 N.W. 533, 158 Mich. 688, 1909 Mich. LEXIS 777, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/conner-v-lake-shore-michigan-southern-railway-co-mich-1909.