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Humble Sand & Gravel9/17/2004
Argued October 30, 2002
JUSTICE HECHT delivered the opinion of the Court, in which JUSTICE OWEN, JUSTICE JEFFERSON, JUSTICE SMITH, JUSTICE WAINWRIGHT, and JUSTICE BRISTER joined.
JUSTICE O'NEILL filed a dissent, in which JUSTICE SCHNEIDER joined.
Generally, a product supplier must warn expected users of foreseeable risks that make the product unreasonably dangerous, but a supplier need not warn of risks that are common knowledge, and when the product is supplied through an intermediary, a supplier may sometimes rely on the intermediary to warn the actual product users. We must apply these basic principles to the circumstances presented in this case. Specifically, the issue is whether a supplier of flint used for abrasive blasting had a duty to warn its customers' employees that inhalation of silica dust can be fatal and that they should wear air-supplied protective hoods, given the customers' knowledge of those dangers.
If the flint supplier in this case had such a duty, it is only because all similarly situated flint suppliers have the same duty, not because of some peculiar aspect of this one defendant's situation. Therefore, to determine whether a general legal duty exists, we must look beyond the particular circumstances of the injury here complained of, just as the parties themselves have done, to the broader industrial setting in which that injury occurred. The record before us establishes that by the 1980s, the dangers of using flint in abrasive blasting had been well known throughout the abrasive blasting industry as well as to health and safety professionals and government regulators for most of the twentieth century, but that blasting workers themselves remained largely ignorant of those dangers, and their employers were careless in enforcing workplace conditions that would protect workers' safety. The record also reflects that federal regulations have been imposed on employers to improve working conditions but not on flint manufacturers to warn of dangers involved in the use of their product. While the parties here no longer dispute that such a warning by the defendant supplier would have prevented the plaintiff's injury, missing from this record is any evidence that, in general, warnings by flint suppliers could effectively reach their customers' employees actually engaged in abrasive blasting. Without such evidence, we are unable to determine whether a duty to warn should be imposed on flint suppliers. Consequently, we reverse the judgment of the court of appeals and, in the interest of justice, remand the case to the trial court for a new trial.
I.
Raymond Gomez contracted silicosis while working at and around abrasive blasting (often but less accurately called sandblasting) for about 61/2 years, from 1984-1987 and again from 1991-1994, at plants in Odessa, where he was born and raised, and in Corpus Christi, where his wife was from. In 1995, Gomez filed suit in Jefferson County against more than twenty defendants, including four suppliers of flint used as the abrasive in the blasting work, two suppliers of blasting equipment, thirteen suppliers of protective gear worn by workers, and several jobsite owners. Gomez settled with all of the defendants except Humble Sand & Gravel Company, one of the flint suppliers, for a total of $389,200, and then following a jury trial obtained a judgment against Humble for about $2 million. Much of the evidence relevant to the issues now before us was undisputed at trial, but where it was conflicting, we of course recite that which was most favorable to Gomez.
Gomez left school after the ninth grade because his wife was pregnant with their first child. Within the year, at
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