Farmers Butane Gas Co., Inc. v. Walker

489 S.W.2d 949, 1973 Tex. App. LEXIS 2386
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJanuary 18, 1973
Docket5211
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 489 S.W.2d 949 (Farmers Butane Gas Co., Inc. v. Walker) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Farmers Butane Gas Co., Inc. v. Walker, 489 S.W.2d 949, 1973 Tex. App. LEXIS 2386 (Tex. Ct. App. 1973).

Opinion

OPINION

JAMES, Justice.

This is a venue matter involving Subdivision 9a of Article 1995, Vernon’s Annotated Texas Civil Statutes. Plaintiff-Ap-pellee Dr. Barvo Walker brought this suit *950 against Defendant-Appellant Farmers Butane Gas Co., Inc., in the District Court of Bosque County, Texas, for damages to his ranch house caused by an explosion and fire, all of which occurred shortly after Defendant-Appellant had delivered butane gas and placed it in Plaintiff-Appellee’s butane tank. Defendant-Appellant filed its plea of privilege to be sued in Hamilton County, Texas, the county of its legal residence. Plaintiff-Appellee having controverted Defendant-Appellant’s plea of privilege, the trial court after hearing overruled the plea of privilege, from which Defendant-Appellant appeals. We affirm.

Plaintiff-Appellee Dr. Barvo Walker is a dentist who resides in Tarrant County, Texas. In 1965 he and his wife purchased a ranch in Bosque County, Texas, upon which was located an old residence house which the Doctor and his family used on weekends and in the summer. About twelve feet from the house was a butane tank buried in the ground except for the dome cover, under which cover were the filler, vapor return outlet, and other fittings more particularly hereinafter described. The butane tank was connected by pipe to the cookstove in the kitchen. The butane tank was in place at the time the Walkers bought the ranch in 1965, and had apparently been there several years prior thereto. There is no testimony as to how long it had been there, except that the caretaker, Walter Allen Dodson, estimated it had been there twelve to fifteen years.

Walter Allen Dodson of Iredell, Texas, sixty-eight years of age, was employed by the Walkers as caretaker of the ranch, and had been employed in that capacity ever since the Walkers bought the ranch in 1965. Dodson usually went to the ranch house every day. Mrs. Walker called Dodson and told him that they were coming to the ranch to spend Thanksgiving, and asked him to have plenty of firewood chopped. This reminded Dodson that the butane supply was low, and before eight o’clock on the morning of November 25, 1970, Dodson telephoned Farmers Butane at Hico, Texas, and ordered 100 gallons of butane gas to be delivered to Dr. Walker’s butane tank. Dodson was told that the butane would be delivered shortly. While waiting for the Farmers Butane truck to arrive, Dodson went into the kitchen and turned on one (or possibly two) of the burners of the cookstove and warmed his hands. The pilot light on the cookstove was burning that morning as it customarily did all the time. The delivery truck arrived at the ranch house about 8:30 AM: whereupon Dodson turned off the burner (or burners) of the cookstove, leaving the pilot burning, and went outside and showed the driver how best to position his truck to fill the tank. The driver inserted the hose into the butane tank and proceeded to fill the tank. While the butane tank was being filled, Dodson looked at the pressure gauge on the tank and observed that it was registering over 100 pounds per square inch pressure, and indicated the red danger zone of the gauge. About five minutes after the delivery truck had left, Dodson went back into the kitchen and observed flames coming up from behind the cook-stove, between the cookstove and the wall, which flames were risiiig about two feet above the cookstove. Dodson grabbed a bucket from the cabinet, filled it with water, and put the flames out that were on top of the cookstove; however, he was unable to get enough water behind the stove to put out that fire. At this juncture, the pipe line between the wall and the cook-stove blew out or burst, blowing gas straight up towards the ceiling; and when this gas came in contact with the flames it caused an explosion. When the explosion occurred, Dodson left the house and drove to Iredell to “get the fire department.” The fire department “came right on out,” but they were unable to put out the fire. As a result, Dr. Walker’s ranch house burned to the ground, along with all of its contents. The house and contents were valued at $44,000.00.

Plaintiff-Appellee introduced the testimony of Charles Parrish, a registered en *951 gineer for Haag Engineering Company of Dallas, Texas, who had had extensive experience not only as a professional engineer, but also as an employee of Lone Star Gas Company. Parrish went out to the Walker ranch on December 12, 1970 and made an inspection of the butane tank (which was still buried in its original location) as well as the premises where the ranch house stood. He talked to Dodson about the circumstances surrounding the explosion and fire. He observed the various fittings of the butane tank under the dome cover, such as the filler opening, vapor return outlet, dial type pressure gauge, the “pop” valve, the “off and on” valve, and pressure regulator.

The vapor return outlet was a fitting into which a hose could be connected to run back to the tank of the delivery truck, so that when the buried tank is being filled any excess vapor pressure would be carried back to the truck tank. This is a safety feature designed to avoid excess pressure from being built up inside the buried tank. (In this connection, this vapor return outlet was not utilized by the Farmers Butane driver, even though the pressure gauge showed the pressure to be in the danger zone.)

The “pop” valve is also a safety feature, which will release excess tank pressure into the air. By “excess tank pressure” is meant pressure in excess of 101 pounds per square inch, insofar as Dr. Walker’s butane tank is concerned. Vapor released by the “pop” valve into the air can also be dangerous, as such vapor can drift under the house and cause an explosion. In our situation, the “pop” valve did not function so as to release the excess pressure.

Parrish testified that one of the copper fittings of the butane tank was swollen, which indicated to him that the tank contained high pressure.

The pressure regulator is designed as a safety feature to hold excess high pressure in the tank and prevent it from being transmitted into the house. In other words, when the tank pressure exceeds 101 pounds per square inch, the pressure regulator is supposed to keep this excess pressure from leaving the tank. In our case, when the tank was filled, the pressure regulator did not hold the excess pressure back, and the high pressure went on into the house to the cookstove.

Parrish testified that in January, 1971, the butane tank was dug up and removed to Dallas, Texas, where he analyzed the contents. He found the contents then remaining in the tank to contain 22% propane, .7% ethane, 14% isobutane, and 63.-3% normal butane. Since propane is a high pressure gas as opposed to butane, which is a low pressure gas, this analysis of the tank contents confirmed the opinion he already had reached; namely, that the explosion and fire had been caused by excess pressure being piped into the house and cookstove. That is to say, Parrish’s chemical analysis of the tank contents was merely cumulative in nature, and corroborated the opinion he had already reached as a result of his physical inspection of the premises and his conversation with Dodson.

The Walker butane tank and system was a low pressure system designed for the use of butane, and was not designed to use a high pressure gas such as propane.

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Bluebook (online)
489 S.W.2d 949, 1973 Tex. App. LEXIS 2386, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/farmers-butane-gas-co-inc-v-walker-texapp-1973.