Slip and Fall Claim Succeeds After Plaintiff Injured on Wet Boardwalk

Reasons for judgement were published today by the BC Supreme Court, Vancouver Registry, addressing fault and damages for a fall a Plaintiff sustained while walking on a wet boardwalk.

In today’s case (Owens v. Steveston Waterfront Properties Inc.) the Plaintiff fell and broke her right kneecap in an incident described as follows:

the plaintiff was walking on a part of a boardwalk in Steveson, of which the defendant is the occupier, when she slipped and fell (the “Incident”).  She was walking on the boardwalk after having a meal (a soup and one beer) at the Restaurant.  The plaintiff was 61 years old at the time of the Incident.  She had followed her husband, Mr. Owens, who was also in his sixties, down a ramp with a small incline that was just outside the Restaurant to the boardwalk.  Although the wooden planks of the boardwalk looked dry, she slipped, landing on her knee.  She testified that, had there been a sign warning of a slipping hazard, she would not have tried to walk down the ramp to the boardwalk.

The Court found she fell due to the slipperiness of the boardwalk and that it did not appear wet.  The court noted the Defendant could have placed a warning sign or, at relatively low cost, installed strips to increase the friction for patrons walking on the boardwalk.  In finding the Defendant liable Madam Justice Maisonville provided the following reasons:

[110]     I find that the risk respecting the boardwalk was unreasonable. The defendant has a positive duty to take reasonable care to make the boardwalk safe to be walked on. Although evidence of local practice is not determinative, having considered that occupiers for the neighbouring boardwalks had mounted signs warning of the potential slipping hazard, I am persuaded that the facts that the boardwalk could be slippery when wet and that this wetness would not always be visually noticeable to visitors, amounts to a recognizable risk that required some positive action on the part of the defendant.

[111]     I do not accept the defendant’s characterization that wetness was an “inherent risk” of such a nature that the plaintiff should have been aware of it being slippery, given she had considered this potential and indeed looked for evidence of that risk. Given no visual clues arise from the wood itself I find that a sign should have been erected at the top of the ramp to warn that it could be slippery given the variable weather conditions at the site.

[112]     There was ease in avoiding the risk by either putting a frictional surface such as a metal grate on the boardwalk to reduce the slipperiness that wetness would cause, or even erecting a sign, warning visitors of the invisible danger. The costs of reducing the risk of slipperiness would have been minimal. As such, in all the circumstances, I find that the defendant breached its duty under the OLA to the plaintiff in failing to take any steps to reduce or eliminate the risk posed by the boardwalk becoming slippery when wet…

[121]     The breach of duty by the defendant, accordingly, is its failure to put up a caution sign. But for there being a sign visible to someone approaching the boardwalk, the Incident would not have occurred. Therefore, I find the plaintiff has established on a balance of probabilities that the defendant is liable for any damages flowing from the Incident.