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Davis v. Cessna Aircraft Corp.9/20/1994
TOCI, Judge
Shortly after departure from the Sedona airport, a Cessna T210 airplane collided with unmarked power lines over Interstate Highway 17 ("I-17") near Camp Verde, Arizona. The crash killed the pilot, Marlin E. Davis, Jr., and the passengers, Herbert E. Davis, Matthew A. Davis, and Robert H. Hensley II (collectively, "the decedents").
Marlin and Joyce Davis and Robert and Pamela Hensley (collectively, "plaintiffs"), the surviving parents of the decedents, sued Cessna Aircraft Corporation ("Cessna"), Teledyne Industries, Inc. ("Teledyne"), and the Arizona Public Service Company ("APS") for wrongful death. Plaintiffs sought recovery against Cessna and Teledyne for negligence and products liability, claiming that the aircraft's defectively designed fuel system caused an in-flight engine failure. Plaintiffs sued APS for negligently locating the power lines and for failing to mark them so that they were visible to aircraft.
The trial court concluded that APS owed no duty of care to the decedents and granted summary judgment in favor of APS on plaintiffs' negligence claim. The court dismissed plaintiffs' strict liability claim against Cessna, finding that the claim was barred by the statute of repose, Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. ("A.R.S.") section 12-551 (1992) (held unconstitutional, Hazine v. Montgomery
Elevator Co., 176 Ariz. 340, 861 P.2d 625 (1993)). After a jury trial on the remaining claims against Cessna, the jury returned verdicts in favor of Cessna and Teledyne.
Plaintiffs appeal from the summary judgment in favor of APS, the dismissal of their strict liability claim against Cessna, and the jury verdicts in favor of Cessna and Teledyne. In resolving the issues on appeal, we reach the following Conclusions: (1) APS did owe a duty of care to the decedents, but its failure to mark its power lines did not create an unreasonable risk of harm to normally operating aircraft and, therefore, APS did not breach its duty to the decedents to guard against the risk of unreasonable harm; (2) the trial court erred by admitting the National Transportation Safety Board's ("NTSB") probable cause Conclusion that the crash was caused by the pilot "buzzing" the highway; (3) because of our supreme court's decision in Hazine, decided after the trial in this matter, holding A.R.S. section 12-551 unconstitutional, the trial court erred by dismissing plaintiffs' strict liability claim against Cessna; and (4) because plaintiffs produced no evidence from which reasonable people could conclude that Teledyne's engine was defective, the trial court should have granted a directed verdict in favor of Teledyne.
Plaintiffs have raised numerous other issues they contend require reversal. Because this matter will be retried to a different trial Judge, we confine this opinion to only those issues necessary to dispose of this appeal. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment in favor of Teledyne, affirm the summary judgment in favor of APS, reverse the judgments in favor of Cessna, and remand for a new trial on plaintiffs' claims against Cessna.
I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
Cessna moved to dismiss plaintiffs' strict liability claim, arguing that it was barred by Arizona's statute of repose, A.R.S. section 12-551. The trial court agreed, dismissed the claim, and certified the order as a final judgment under Rule 54(b), Arizona Rules of Civil Procedure. On appeal, another panel of this court concluded that because the trial court's order was not a final judgment, the order was not appealable. See Davis v. Cessna Aircraft
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