Posted on 10/14/2025 4:37:18 AM PDT by DallasBiff
An elderly New Yorker was tragically killed when Monday’s nor’easter blew a solar panel from a roof and sent it careening into the streets below.
A forceful wind gust ripped the massive solar panel – more than 7-by-3 feet across — from an outdoor parking lot structure on Ocean Parkway near Brighton Beach Avenue, according to the NYPD and the city’s Department of Buildings.
The panel was swept up by the wind and flew about 20 feet, then struck 76-year-old Lyudmila Braun, cops and buildings officials said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I worked for a company that had a similar issue resulting in a fatality. The installer ordered the wrong product, relabeled it with their name, used it in an incorrect application and when it failed, the manufacturer, who had far deeper pockets was sued and lost.
It worked out well for me. They had let me go in a reorganization with a one year non-compete. In the midst of the legal case, I was being hired by another company but the non-compete held me up. The new company lawyer called the busy old company lawyer and the non-compete was quickly nullified since they were too busy to worry about it.
Are there "industry standards" regulating specifically the installation of giant stuffed owls on parapets, balustrades, or roof ridges? No? Then if my giant stuffed owl falls off my roof and kills you, your next of kin have no legal recourse?!
Regards,
Most solar companies are fly-by-night scams. It doesn’t surprise me that shoddy installation ended up killing someone.
It's the Tombstone Mentality that was first described in aviation safety; ignoring flaws until enough people have died because of them. There is no incentive for an entity to be a 'first mover' and promote safety, whether due to costs or to legal disincentives.
https://leehamnews.com/2025/03/06/the-faa-tombstone-agency-or-hampered-by-tombstone-politics/
It's sick. "Until someone dies, we'll consider it safe."
It's the same warped mindset that has human beings unwillingly serving as guinea pigs for computer driven automobile testing, DNA altering shots, etc.
Yes, during a Hurricane season where we did not have ONE storm touch the mainland of the USA. Which is pretty rare.
Even the storm that caused the recent destruction on the Outer Banks did not really ever come ashore. The eye of that storm stayed well offshore.
I can't believe that a careless electrician hasn't been fried by a solar array. Although it's DC voltage, it can be HIGH voltage. My electrician son accidentally grabbed one leg of one of my panel strings. The particular string consisted of 16 64"x48" panels wired in series, that generates 280 volts at 8,320 watts in full sun. He said he's never been shocked so hard in his life.
Solar panels are more HIGH amperage than voltage but still smarts if you grab the wrong thing.
Well, well, well... I hope these global warming lunatics are happy. This is their fault, just like global warming is their fault too.
Actually, my panels are rated 37.42 volts and 11.09 amps on the front side. They are wired in series,so the amperage doesn't change. But, it makes the voltage 299.6 peak for an 8 panel string. There are four strings split between two controllers.
Don’t you just hate it when you are eating a bologna sandwich and playing with a stapler, and you accidently staple the bologna to your tongue?
I hate it when that happens.
A 769W panel with a system voltage of 380V would have an amperage of approximately 20.2A (\(769W\div 380V\approx 20.2A\.
The amps do the damage
Palsgraf v. Long Island R.R. Co.
Citation. 248 N.Y. 339 (N.Y. 1928)
Brief Fact Summary.
The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the Second Judicial Department (New York) affirmed the trial court’s holding that the Long Island R. Co. (Defendant) was responsible for injuries to Plaintiff resulting from an explosion. The Defendant appealed.
Synopsis of Rule of Law.
To recover for negligence, the plaintiff must establish each of the following elements: duty, standard of care, breach of duty, cause-in-fact, proximate cause (scope of liability) and damages.
Facts.
The Plaintiff was standing on a railroad platform purchasing a ticket, when a train stopped and two men ran forward to catch it. One of the men nearly fell, and two railroad employees attempted to help him. In the process, a package containing fireworks fell and the contents exploded. As a result of the explosion some scales at the other end of the platform fell and struck the Plaintiff. Plaintiff sued and a jury found in her favor. The Appellate Division affirmed this decision, but the Court of Appeals of New York reversed.
Issue.
What constitutes negligence?
Held.
The court reversed the appellate court judgment and dismissed the complaint.
Dissent. The dissent takes the view that, as a matter of law, it could not be determined that the Defendant’s actions were not the proximate cause of the Plaintiff’s injuries. Justice Andrews concluded that the judgment should have been affirmed.
* In perhaps one of the most significant dissents in modern tort law, Justice Andrews in Palsgraf expresses what has become the matrix for measuring the scope of one’s duty and its relationship to causation in connection with negligence claims.
Essentially, Justice Andrews’ formulation is a consideration of the appropriate tests for proximate (or legal) cause – the third element in the formula for tort law (duty, breach, causation and harm).
* Concerning negligence, Andrews first asks “[i]s it a relative concept – the breach of some duty owing to a particular person or to particular persons? Or where there is an act which unreasonably threatens the safety of others, is the doer liable for all its proximate consequences, even where they result in injury to one who would generally be thought to be outside the radius of danger?” The latter is often characterized as the “zone of danger” or “zone of impact” i.e., the area in which the plaintiff is at risk of physical impact resulting from the alleged wrongdoer’s negligent behavior. As Justice Andrews notes, “[n]egligence may be defined roughly as an act or omission which unreasonably does or may affect the rights of others, or which unreasonably fails to protect oneself from the dangers resulting from such acts.”
* He offers the concise maxim, “[e]very one owes to the world at large the duty of refraining from those acts that may unreasonably threaten the safety of others,” and further notes, “[w]hen injuries do result from our unlawful act we are liable for the consequences. It does not matter that they are unusual, unexpected, unforeseen and unforseeable. But there is one limitation. The damages must be so connected with the negligence that the latter may be said to be the proximate cause of the former.”
Discussion.
Plaintiff must show that some wrong was done to herself, i.e., that there was a violation of her own rights, not merely a wrong done to someone else. In this case, there was nothing to indicate that the package contained fireworks, and if dropped, would cause an explosion. The guards, who were assisting the passenger on the train, were negligent in doing so, and caused the package to be dislodged, which fell causing an explosion. The explosion caused some scales at the other end of the platform to fall, striking Plaintiff. The guards were not negligent in relation to the Plaintiff, who was standing far away when the package was dropped. If the court had decided that Defendant was negligent in respect to the Plaintiff, then the majority concludes that a defendant would be liable for any and all consequences of its negligence, “however novel or extraordinary.”
I had that happen once while I was driving (thankfully) through a new home construction site — the wind picked up a 4’ x 8’ panel of sheetrock and it blew across a traffic lane and slammed up against my moving car, scratching a fender and two doors. Glad I wasn’t walking.
If a "thing" flies off a building during high winds, and kills a pedestrian below, the court should have no problem determining culpability, assessing damages, and setting a price to make the victim (or her family) "whole" again.
That it is a solar panel instead of the metal door of a circuit box should make no difference: It should have withstood the high winds, but it didn't.
Regards,
Correct. And now safety officials might start the process to see if anything needs to change. The fact the "news" already calls this a "freak accident" points toward them getting the cue that no one is going to change anything until there are more tombstones.
They're not going to jeopardize the solar energy con.
Exactly the logic of the Palsgraf dissent.
The proximate cause is the failure to secure the panel against winds of reasonably expected strength.
Sadly, it's the dissent, not the opinion.
The system is not set up for safety, it's set up to make money. Even the term "accident" is a misdirection. There was no accident here. It's somewhere between design failures, installation failures, ranging from negligence to criminal.
The preventive solutions were foreseeable, both prior to the panel being launched airborne and afterwards; industry standards, stronger hardware, retention cables, panels that shatter instead of remaining intact, inspections, etc.
That blade could have remained bolted in place, could have been lashed with steel retention cables, could have broken into small pieces and remained on the roof, etc. but instead became a deadly blade because the industry, the manufacturers, the owners, and the installers, don't want to put forth proper effort to protect innocent passersby.
They are generally thin wafers attached to a 1/8” to 1/4” sheet of aluminum.
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