It’s been another lovely winter in Illinois. It was brutally cold earlier in the week and while it’s slightly warmer, there is still bad weather and probably some bad weather to come.
The worst day so far this winter was February 6th. There was a terrible ice storm that day. As a result I’ve been contacted by at least 10 people since then who fell and sustained injuries. And it happened not just in Chicago, but in the suburbs and collar counties as well. I cant’ remember a day so bad for injuries to workers that were all similar.
Fortunately most people who called me had a case, but not all of them. A couple of the workers have jobs that require them to be outside. That’s essentially their office. So their slip and falls were similar to someone who works inside and fell on a wet floor. They all clearly have cases.
One person fell inside due to someone dragging water in on their boots. The ice was outside, but for them, the danger was inside. That’s also a case because it happened in an area where they have to walk and was inside their place of business. It sucks they were hurt, but if they were just a customer at the store they wouldn’t have had a case. So fortunately they will get paid for their time off, get all of their bills paid and get a settlement.
Another guy who reached out to me got hurt while taking a box out to the dumpster. That is clearly a case as is the one who was hurt going to their car to grab their phone charger.
Two of the callers fell in the parking lot where they work. One had a case and one doesn’t. The good one was a worker whose company required him to park in a certain spot. That area is only open to workers and the company owns the property. Any of those things alone would make it a work comp case and he had all three.
The bad one worked for a big department store in a well known mall. The mall isn’t owned by her employer and she can park wherever she wants. She parked in an area open to the public and fell when exiting her vehicle. This was before the work day started. While theoretically she could sue the property owner or landlord, especially if they were required to salt and shovel, in this case there’s no liability for work comp unfortunately.
The injuries ran the gambit. Wrist sprain, fractured wrist, torn ACL, back injuries, shoulder sprain, likely torn rotator cuff and a groin injury from doing the splits. While we know it’s not going to be summer weather soon, hopefully we don’t have another nightmare storm like this. In 28 years of being an attorney I don’t recall one specific weather event injuring so many people.
