Lords Reverse Earlier Award in Burst Tyre Case
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THE House of Lords last week gave judgment unanimously reversing a majority decision of the Court of Appeal in favour of the South Wales Transport Co., Ltd., owner of a double-deck bus which ran off the road and down a railway embankment near Llanelly. in 1943, after the off-side front tyre had burst.
Mrs. Eunice Irene Barkway, of Llanelly, widow of one of four passengers killed in the accident was, at Glamorgan Assizes, awarded £2,025 damages against the company for its negligence in failing properly to maintain the tyre. The Court of Appeal. by a majority, held that there was no negligence, either in the question of maintenance or in the speed at which the bus was driven, and set aside the award. Against that decision Mrs. Barkway had appealed.
Lord Porter said that it was accepted by the judge at the trial that the burst was because of an impact fracture which occurred some time earlier. Although he agreed that the driver of the bus must have exceeded the speed limit over parts of the journey, he found nothing to indicate that the speed caused more rapid disintegration of the tyre.
He thought that the company's general practice in the inspection and overhaul of tyres was adequate, but that it was negligent in not instructing its drivers to report a blow to a tyre which would be heavy enough to cause an impact fracture. It was the duty of the company to instruct its employees as to
the effect which a heavy blow might produce.
It had been said that a burst caused by an impact fracture was rare. The duty of a transport company, however, was to take all reasonable precautions for the safety of its passengers, and in this case that was not done.
Damages of £500 were awarded to the complainant at Newcastle Assizes recently when Mrs. Eva Easter, of Seaham Harbour, claimed damages from the Northern General Transport Co., Ltd., in respect of personal injuries in a bus accident.
Ft was stated that a crowded double deck bus was proceeding along the Sunderland-Seaham road when a front tyre burst. Forty-five people were injured, two of them seriously.
Mr. Justice Streatfeild said that the reason for the tyre burst was unknown.