Tracer asked
Those pies are tricky. The crust tends to insulate your fingers from the lava inside, and only after biting it do you realize what is happening. That notice is important, but I imagine that people don’t realize how important until after biting in. I think they should change it to “CAUTION – apple filling is HOTTER than the crust” or something.
Do you mean by that “McDonald’s refusing to take responsibility for their negligence?”
Good job Melin and tomndebb for the references.
I’d like to know where this figure comes from. I’ve read quotes of the plaintif’s attorney giving this figure, but based on my own measurements, 140 is lukewarm for coffee. Adam Yax’s link gave 180 - 185 as the right temperature, in line with my own recollections.
It is too clear, and so it is hard to see.
While I accept that she did have a strong case against McDonalds, I think the issue of personal responsibility does come up. After all, if (and many people here believe this to be the case) normally brewed coffee (not necessarily McDonald’s coffee) is served at around 180 degrees, than the McDonald’s coffee was only slightly hotter than that. I am no law expert, but I do remember hearing something to the effect of the nature of the thing being consumed may contain certain risks that are agreed upon by the consumer. If it is the case that it is not unreasonable to expect normally brewed coffee to be at 190, then the woman’s case probably has more to do with the combination of hot coffee and faulty lid, with the emphasis on the faulty lid.
After all, I don’t find anything wrong with having coffee at such high temperatures. I’m not a big coffee drinker, but I expect my tea to be so hot that I must very carefully sip it. I’m aware that the tea could seriously hurt me. It’s be a shame if people could not serve me at the temperature I wanted because they were afraid of lawsuits. I think this is what people don’t like about this suit.
However, I do agree that when McDonalds is serving coffee that hot, they better be very careful about how they put the lid on, and may even want to warn people how hot it is.
No - I mean that 100% of the responsibility lies with the lady who dumped the coffee in her own lap, and 0% lies with McD’s. The temperature of the coffee has nothing to do with the division of responsibility. Coffee, tea, or hot choc can be hot enough to burn. Gradeschool children know this.
And I agree with the people above who posted that 140F is absurdly cool for the initial temp of a hot beverage.
From another poster:
Also, by sipping a very hot beverage, some air mixes with small drops of the liquid on the way in, and since the volume to surface area ratio of the drops is so low, they cool immediately. So you can sip much hotter beverages than you can drink, and having them start out very hot maximizes the time you can enjoy them before they cool off too much.
But I guess we have to dumb everything down so that the lowest common denominator cannot possibly do anything to ever hurt themselves. Perhaps next on the list is steak knives. People routinely cut themselves with these, and the manufacturers sell the knives knowing full well that people will be injured! My knives don’t even have warning labels, so how in the world am I supposed to know that I could get hurt? After that maybe there should be warnings to not fall off of ladders. Oh yeah, they already have those :-|.
Damn. I wasn’t going to let myself get all worked up over this one yet again :-). Oh well. Haven’t had a good rant in a while.
–
peas on earth
I’m tired of know-nothings second-guessing what the jury did in this case after listening to the evidence, which none of you are in full possession of.
Regardless of what the actual numbers were as to the temperature (and recall that I said I was doing it off the top of my head), the fact remains that the testimony was that the coffee served at McDonald’s was unreasonably hotter than was to be expected, and than as is the norm at other restaurants. Get it? This is not normal coffee temperatures that we are talking about. Normal coffee temperatures do not inflict THIRD DEGREE BURNS.
Okay, raise your hands. How manny of you have spilled coffee on yourself? Great. I bet the answer is everybody who drinks coffee. I DON’T drink coffee and I’ve still managed to do it. Now, how manny of you have ended up in the hospital for a week or more, with THIRD DEGREE BURNS and SKIN GRAFTS as a result of spilling that coffee? I bet the answer is none of you.
The testimony was that this coffee was SIGNIFICANTLY HOTTER THAN COFFEE IS NORMALLY SERVED AT. Nobody, including McDonald’s, disputed that at trial. McDonald’s tried to defend that by stating that it sells coffee for people to take home or to the office to be consumed, but they were impeached with their own studies that show that people buy it to be consumed right away.
I think that with several hundred burns prior to this one, and having paid out $500,000+ in claims for burns prior to this claim, the “personal responsibility” issue is squarely in McDonald’s lap. THEY are the ones who knew that their product was dangerously different from the norm. THEY are the ones who had the ability to control that product. My training is as a defense lawyer, and I would have voted in favor of the plaintiff on this case. And had I been the defense lawyer, it never would have gone to trial.
-Melin
This would not seem to be even a remotely reasonable assumption. I’m hardly a coffee connoisseur, but the recommended water temperature for making coffee is roughly 195F for most types, and that’s a common temperature for coffee pots to be set to, so it would be quite stupid indeed to blindly assume coffee you don’t know the temperature of is safe to dump on yourself. Hot beverages can burn you. A gradeschool student knows this. We are not talking about rocket science here.
I have, exactly once. It burned like an SOB, and guess what? I discovered it isn’t a good idea and I learned to be more careful. But even if I did it again tomorrow, I sure as heck wouldn’t blame my own actions on somebody else who wasn’t responsible for them. I cannot see that as anything but absurd. Anyway, since I had made the stuff myself, who do I sue then? I’m all confused.
Basically, if I spill coffee on my self, it’s my own bloody fault regardless of whethe the coffee was boiling hot or just above freezing. If I cut myself with a knife, it’s my own fault no matter how sharp the knife. If I whack myself on the thumb with a hammer, it’s my own fault no matter how heavy the hammer. If somebody else whacks me with a hammer or dumps hot coffee on me, it’s their fault.
I do not see it that way at all. They had no control over the cup at the time, nor did they make her spill it, or suggest to her that she should spill it, nor did the product have any danger that an elementary school student could not reasonably have anticipated.
I really grow tired of our legal system catering to total idiots when there are deep pockets to be plumbed. I will grant that you mostly hear about the absurdly exceptional cases like this one, and all the ones with reasonable outcomes go unnoticed by the public. But even one such outcome is too many.
I can only form my opinion based on the evidence that is available. If more shows up that would put moral responsibility on McDs (such as one of their employees going out and spilling the coffee on her), then I’ll reconsider my opinion. That’s the best I can do, isn’t it? But as presented in the media and discussed here, I see absolutely no reason to blame McDs. It was an unfortunate accident. I’m sorry the lady got burned, but she isn’t automatically owed money as a result of something she did to herself.
–
peas on earth
This attitude really pisses me off. If you don’t like this thread, leave. Before you go, let me ask you this: Have you ever measured the temperature of your coffee or tea as you drank it? Do you know what temperature is too hot for you? Do you even know how hot it is at the temperature you like it?
I have measured the temperature to see where I like it. I repeated that measurement this morning, to be certain I wasn’t misremembering. For me, 140 degrees (not just your figure; I’ve read it elsewhere, including Tomndebb’s link) is not hot enough, even to start with. My preferred temperature is 160 - 170. I can still sip it at 180. At 185, I was starting to burn my tongue, but could still drink it. I didn’t go any higher. If McD’s served me coffee at 140, I’d send it back.
I can’t answer why McD’s lawyers didn’t handle this case better. I don’t know why they didn’t counter the assertion that normal coffee temperature was 140. And I don’t necessarily blame the jury for their decision, given the testimony. I doubt the jurors ever measured the temperature of coffee or tea as they drank it either. But testimony is not truth. I like my coffee best between 160 - 170. I’d like to be served to-go coffee at 180. I may not be Joe Average, but I doubt I’m the only one who likes my coffee as hot as I do. 180 is not outside the normal range of acceptable coffee temperature, no matter what the testimony may have been. The difference between 140 and 190 is huge. The difference between 180 and 190 isn’t. The difference between a 50 degree difference and a 10 degree difference is possibly the difference between winnng and losing a lawsuit.
[…making melin’s shit-list…]
It is too clear, and so it is hard to see.
Maybe we need to design better clothing. 
If coffee must be served at a few shades below boiling, I’m sure clothing should be better designed to withstand against that. I’m sure all of us has a drink spill on ourselves before.
This SterlingNorth drive-by has been brought to you by milk.
Never served hot. Maybe warm, not hot.
Got Milk?
I think that some are not clear about just how severe third-degree burns are. Sunburns are usually first-degree burns. According to AOL’s online dictionary (MW):
"third-degree burn (noun)
First appeared 1930
: a severe burn characterized by destruction of the skin through its deeper layers and possibly into underlying tissues, loss of fluid, and sometimes shock"
Any liquid that can cause that sort of damage is TOO HOT to be sold without a warning. The McD’s in question knew that their coffee was too hot, and was a danger to its consumers. And it stupidly kept selling it at that temp.
I’m sorry if this offends a couple of people who like burning their mouths. But on the other hand, I don’t eat a lot of restaurant food because it contains ingredients I don’t like or can’t tolerate.
Lynn
If it’s helpful, I’ll compare everyone to Hitler so we can get this
over with as soon as possible.
I’m sorry, but this sort of thinking really steams me. I was raised in a way that put a high value on personal responsibility, and accepting the consequences of one’s own actions. Apparently this is becoming something of a lost value, and even the very concept is offensive to some people.
Look, we live in a world that has dangerous objects in it. There is no guarantee that everything is safe all the time. People commonly interact with hot only hot liquids, but knives, ladders, chainsaws, automobiles, shutguns, cliffs, bleach, radial arm saws, and a whole host of things that, if not given a certain level of respect, can injure or kill. Part of being a responsible adult human being involves an obligation to understand the dangers involved in life. I completely reject the notion that we must make the world sterile and safe from any arbitrary degree of idiocy. No one should have to be told that hot liquids are dangerous, and failure to mention this does mean you’re owed millions if you hurt yourself.
I cannot seriously believe that people want to live in a world so dumbed down that we must have warnings on cups of hot coffee, which will be sold lukewarm so that nobody can possibly injure themselves. This is absurd - gradeschool children know the danger of hot liquids. To what nadir would you suggest we pander here? It seems like whenever something goes wrong, it can never be my fault, so somebody else must pay. Horse puckey, I say. This is something that is broken in our culture, and we need to fix it. Only in the USA do you find responsibility-avoidance taken to quite this extreme.
I’m not suggesting that things like manufacturing defects are the fault of consumers. But coffee is supposed to be hot. For best flavor, it is often recommended that 195F water be used. It is not a defect in the coffee that it is hot, any more than it’s a defect in a knife that it is sharp. Nobody owes anyone protection from their own incompetence, as shocking as that might sound to some folks.
–
peas on earth
I had heard about this, but not in so much detail until now. At first I thought it was ludicrous that this woman could sue because she spilled it on herself, I can see a lawsuit if a McDonalds employee spilled it on her, but she accidentally did it herself. Now after reading some more I do believe that McDs had some responsibility, at the very least they should have paid for all of her medical care, but I really do not think that McDs was $600,000 worth of responsibility.
Of course, I always seem to stand in the middle somewhere on issues.
However,
Since a court found McDs liable, does this mean I can go buy a Smith&Wesson pistol, shoot myself in the foot, and then sue the company for half a million because there was no warning label on the gun and other people have been known to be shot by guns?
“Wow! Spider-Man! Are you really friends with the X-men?”
"Not since Cyclops tried to use my viewmaster."
(Marvel Team Up #1)
ZenBeam & Bantmof et. al. …
The jury made their decision based on common sense and reasoning too. As had been mentioned earlier, McDonald’s coffee was found to be unreasonably hot, and therefore partially responsible for the third degree burns. All that means is that ** the coffee was hotter than what a normal person would have expected **. This has nothing to do with whether you like your coffee at 190 or 140 degrees. It’s all about reasonable expectations from the customer.
The fact is the coffee was served much hotter than what McDonald’s own operation manuals suggested. Since most stores follow the manual, a reasonable customer would come to expect that this particular McDonald would serve its coffee at a certain temperature too (not to mention many other places serve coffee at a lower temperature too).
If coffee were served at 190 degrees around the world, or even just prevalent enough in the US that the average person would expect it to be at 190 degrees, then McDonalds would have won this case without a doubt. However, it has been shown that 190 degrees is significantly higher than the expected temperature, therefore McDonald must take some blame. You can argue all you want about what your expectations are, but it will not change anything about the average person, which is in this case represented by a panel of jurors.
It is also with this line of reasoning why your example with steak knives holds no grounds at all. The average person fully expects a steak knife to be sharp, and that’s why no steak knife manufacturer is likely to ever be sued for making knives that are too sharp. On the other hand, if the manufacturer installs an electric buzzer in its steak knives that shocks the user, then it would be in a lot of trouble, because the average person does not expect a buzzer there.
This logic applies to many other injury lawsuits as well. If you slip in a department store because some janitor just mopped the floor and forgot to put a wet floor sign up, then you can sure sue the department store for damages. Why? Because the average person does not expect the ground to be slippery. If you happen to be a careful person and noticed the wet floor before walking over it, then that’s great, but it does not mean the department store has no responsibility if someone else slips.
Now shall I go over that silly shoot-your-foot-with-a-pistol example too?
And since the McDonald’s in question was already aware of consumer complaints and injuries stemming from their overly hot coffee, why should they not be held responsible for accepting the consequences of their actions?
You keep harping on the 195 degree temperature of water used to make coffee; that does not mean that coffee need be served at 195, or even at 180. Most baked goods require oven temps in the 325-450 range; this has nothing to do with the temperature at which they are served. 140-160 degrees (the recommended serving temperature) does not equal luke-warm.
Neobican asks:
It depends. Did the company sell you a gun with a bullet in the chamber? A knowledgeable person will check the chamber of every firearm s/he picks up to ensure that there is no bullet loaded. Not everyone is this knowledgeable. Where does the “reasonable person” standard draw the line? I suspect that it would say that a reasonable person would expect not to be handed a loaded pistol inside a gun store. But I could be wrong on that.
Neobican said:
Okay, folks, we seem to have entered into la-la land as to what is a reasonable reaction.
If I spill coffee on myself, I expect to be burned. No one here disputes that, right? That’s common sense, and that’s why we have our panties in such a bunch over this issue.
Now, let me re-state the case. I spill coffee on myself, and the coffee inflicts third-degree burns upon me. My flesh is not merely red, but actually charred. Blisters pucker and form all over where I spilled the coffee, and I end up in the hospital for several weeks while getting skin grafts in order to repair the damaged skin and muscle.
Is that a reasonable reaction to expect?
No, McDonald’s did not spill the coffee upon her. No, McDonald’s did not stick the coffee between her legs and dare her to open the cup there. But, because McDonald’s took an action which defied reasonable expectations- that is, they served a cup of coffee at a temperature high enough to cause third-degree burns- they caused the accident.
Think of it this way. You climb a ladder. On the third-to-the-top rung, you slip off because I decided to spread butter and olive oil on that rung. Is this your fault? You obviously should have been expecting me to put butter and olive oil on that ladder, right? Of course not. You had a reasonable expectation that there would not be butter and olive oil on your ladder. It’s my fault for putting that mixture there, and defying your reasonable expectations for what climbing a ladder would entail.
JMCJ
This is not a sig.
When I first read about the McDonald’s lawsuit several years ago, my first reaction was, “Man, the system is WAY out of control if a company can get sued for millions for serving hot coffee”.
After reading all of the details of the case, it’s clear to me that McDonald’s was negligent, and should have had to pay.
And no, the woman didn’t ‘deserve’ $600,000 or whatever she got, but the point of punitive damages is to punish the company so that they won’t do it again. Without the weapon of punitive damages, companies would continue to produce hazardous products, knowing the worst they could ever have to do is pay the medical bills of someone injured.
That said, the tort system really is out of whack. My personal pet peeve is large awards when it’s discovered that a company ‘callously’ did a cost-benefit analysis for a safety feature. Woe to Ford if a memo is discovered that says they didn’t approve a safety fix because it cost too much money… Frankly, if my engineering department WASN’T producing those studies, I’d fire them. Safety IS something that can cost too much. Cars would be safer if they all had 5-point harnesses, but I’m sure the auto companies don’t put them in because they decided that they’d lose sales because people don’t want them. So somewhere, someone did a study that said, “5-point harnesses save X lives. But they cost X dollars, and will cost X dollars in revenue. So each life saved will cost X dollars, which is not worth it to us.”
Now, if someone ever sued because a family member died in a rollover accident and that memo were to surface, Ford would pay through the nose. But studies like this are PROPER ENGINEERING, and should be done all the time. And the decision can NOT always be, “If it saves even one life we must do it.”
Memos just like that have been used as weapons to award some humongous punitive damages in lawsuits.
The jury award for punitive damages was something like $2.7 million (maybe it was $2.1, I forget). That represented the amount of money that McDonald’s makes in TWO DAYS from selling coffee.
The judge reduced that award, I forget to what, and the case ultimately settled for – rumor hath it – something under $600K. That included medical costs, pain and suffering, and punitives.
-Melin
Because they did nothing wrong? They didn’t hurt that lady - she did it all by herself. And I stand by my argument that a gradeschool child should understand the risks of hot liquids. I find it really hard to believe that reasonable adults don’t know (1) that coffee might be near the boiling point of water, and (2) that such temperatures can cause serious injury. If they don’t, they should. Failure to think does not make someone else at fault for the resulting consequences.
If the bulk of consumers want their coffee to start off at 140F and complain about it being hotter, then fine, let McDs support consumer demand and serve it cooler. I’d prefer hotter, but they should do what sells the most coffee. However, lets not pretend that serving coffee hot is some sort of hostile act. I believe that consumer demand is a valid reason to serve it cooler, but this sort of responsibility-shifting still repulses me. I see it as exactly the same logic that tries to hold light aircraft mfgs responsible when pilot error causes a crash, or gun mfgs liable when a criminal murders. Let’s put the responsibility where it belongs: on the person who took the action.
–
peas on earth
You know, when I handle a coffee I don’t use the same amount of care I’d use if I were handling, say, a cup of hydrochloric acid. The effort I make in handling it is going to be proportional to the risk I perceive should I spill it.
A reasonable person simply would not think that a spilled coffee would cause 3rd degree burns and hospitalisation.
The key to this lawsuit was that McDonald’s had injured people before, and been sued before, and did nothing about it. They had been warned that the coffee was dangerously hot, and did nothing about it.
Your argument that this is the ‘normal’ temperature to serve coffee doesn’t hold water, unless you can provide evidence that EVERY restaraunt routinely gets sued for coffee-related injuries, and the health department is running ragged citing food outlets for hot coffee. Clearly, this McDonald’s was doing something different from the norm.
So NICE to see this case debated rationally - on my side of the Atlantic, it’s often brought up to point out the absurdity of American law. (A lot of my countrymen take delight in bashing everything American, I’m sad to say.)
But is the concept of “punitive damage” really that great ? Of course, the company should be punished for its negligence - but I don’t understand what makes the victim entitled to sums of the magnitude you sometimes hear.
The amount of pain & suffering is the same, whether you buy (and spill, obviously) your coffee at a local diner or at McD’s, right ? So why not have the companies make the same compensation to the victim (medical expenses, pain & suffering, lost income etc.) and then let the state fine the companies for negligence or whatever, regulating the size of the fine in accordance with the company’s income - and make it hurt appropriately ?
Of course, nobody likes seeing the state grab money from otherwise successfull enterprises, but one would suppose it’d reduce the number of unnecessary court cases (if that’s indeed a problem - melin ?)
This is (of course) the European way of doing things. I don’t think there’s that much more of a problem with people getting hurt due to shoddy products or service over here. I would miss the warning folders on mountaineering products, though!
Worrying is the thinking man’s form of meditation.