Electricity improves our lives. It lights homes, powers technology, machines, tools, and appliances, moves cars, treats pain (TENS units), and can even save lives (for example, the cardiac defibrillator).
But contact with electricity can cause severe neurological injuries, burns, and death. Its potential to cause harm is why some states use electrocution as a method of capital punishment.
A substantial number of electrocutions and electrical injuries occur at work. Indeed, an overwhelming majority of high-voltage electrical accidents, the type likely to cause severe injury or death, happen in the workplace. And those of you in the construction, extraction, and trucking industries are most at risk.
This article explains your legal options after an electrocution or electric shock at work or due to someone else’s negligence (including businesses, public utilities, and government entities)
Read on to learn more about electrical injuries and legal remedies for them.
Then call to speak with an award-winning electrocution accident lawyer if you need help with a personal injury, workers compensation, product liability, social security disability, or traumatic brain injury (TBI) case after an electric shock. You can reach us at 804-251-1620 or 757-810-5614.
Electricity is the flow (movement) of electrons between different points.
An electrical injury is damage to the skin, bones, muscles, joints (including ligaments and tendons), soft tissues, or internal organs caused by an electrical current running through your body. You become part of the electric circuit.
The symptoms of electrical injury can range from minor discomfort to organ failure to death.
Multiple organizations compile and report information about fatal and nonfatal occupational electrical injuries.
For example, the data on electrocution injuries and deaths discussed below comes from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and the Electrical Safety Foundation.
There are around 1,000 deaths per year in the United States from electrocution, excluding those who die from burns received in electrical accidents.
Of this number, high-voltage electrical injuries cause approximately four hundred deaths, and lightning causes 50 to 30 fatalities.
Workplace electrocution is a significant health concern.
Between 2011 and 2022, electricity caused 1,322 workplace fatalities, meaning that contact with electricity caused six percent of all occupational deaths.
Each year, there are more than 30,000 electric shock incidents that do not lead to death. However, nonfatal electrical injuries often result in admission to hospital burn units.
While electrical injuries to children occur primarily at home, electrical injuries to adults tend to happen at work.
For example, more than 3,000 nonfatal electrical injuries resulted in time missed from work in a recent year.
These numbers may underestimate the number of work-related electrical injuries and fatalities that occur yearly. Employers, medical providers, state agencies, and federal agencies may classify an electrical accident as another type of event because it often results in multiple external and internal injuries. Indeed, our electrical injury attorneys have seen this happen.
Unsurprisingly, jobs that work with electricity directly, such as electricians, linemen, and employees of electric utilities, suffer electrocution at above-average rates.
However, those with jobs near high-risk electric locations also have an increased risk of electric shock injury. Indeed, OSHA reports that 70% of workplace electrical fatalities occurred in non-electrical occupations.
Below is a list of occupations with high rates of electrical injuries. The number in parentheses refers to the number of fatalities from 2011 through 2022 for this specific job.
This list is not exhaustive. Indeed, we have served as electric shock accident lawyers for office workers and nurses who suffered electrical injuries.
Common occupational accidents resulting in electrical injuries and fatalities include exposures to these hazards:
Our award-winning electrocution accident lawyers have experience resolving claims involving each of these types of electrical hazards.
Yes.
You can be electrocuted or sustain an electric shock injury without touching a power line or live electrical circuit directly.
For example:
Suppose you are a construction worker standing in a “grounded” area. A grounded area does not carry an electric current.
A subcontractor’s employee is beside you, operating an excavator next to a utility pole with a power line.
Suddenly, the subcontractor makes a mistake, hitting the utility pole, which downs the live power line.
When the power line touches the ground, an electric current can travel through the ground and shock or electrocute you even though you have not touched the line.
Kouwenhoven’s factors predict the extent and severity of an electrical injury and your long-term prognosis.
These six factors are:
In addition, pre-existing conditions contribute to the likelihood of fatal electrocution or electric shock causing severe harm: Your age, weight, sex, and pre-existing medical impairments, as well as any medical devices (joint replacements, hardware from spinal fusion, pacemakers, implantable cardioverter defibrillator, cardiac loop recorders, etc.), influence the extent of the electrical injury.
An electrical injury attorney will investigate the source of the current and obtain expert witness evidence on these factors to maximize the value of your electrocution or electric shock case.
Here are the main types of electrical injuries:
These electrical accidents can happen to anyone in any career who works with electricity or operates around it, which is almost all of us.
The damage from electrical injuries ranges from minor wounds that heal within days to harm to multiple body systems that affect the ability to return to work to death.
For example, your electrical injury may cause damage to:
In addition, an electrical injury may cause dehydration, muscle avulsion, hemolysis, coagulation necrosis of muscle tissue, hemolysis, or swelling (edema).
These problems might be temporary and resolve with time. Or they may cause long-term consequences.
Almost all electrical injuries require emergency medical treatment.
From there, you may require follow-up care for orthopedic and internal injuries that includes surgeries, medication, physical therapy, wound care, and extensive rehabilitation.
Electrical injuries force many victims to leave the workforce or transition to a lighter job that may pay less. Indeed, the duration of disability may last years.
These changes may cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars in income over your lifetime.
Recovering as much of these economic losses as possible is another reason to have a skilled electric shock lawyer on your side.
In many situations, you have one to three legal options after an electrocution or electric shock injury.
First, if an electrical injury occurs on the job, you can seek workers’ compensation benefits (temporary total, temporary partial, permanent partial disability, lifetime medical).
You can receive workers comp regardless of fault unless the employer proves you violated a safety rule, and that this specific violation caused your electrical injury.
Further, you can negotiate a workers compensation settlement for an electrical injury.
Also, family members of employees electrocuted on the job may seek death benefits under the Workers Compensation Act.
Second, you may have a tort claim (civil action for personal injuries) against the person, government entity, company, or manufacturer whose acts or omissions caused the electrical accident. These lawsuits are called third-party actions.
The advantage of a tort claim is you can recover additional money damages compared to workers compensation. For example, personal injury and wrongful death pay for pain and suffering and do not cap economic damages.
However, you must prove all elements of negligence to prevail, including proving fault. This can be challenging, particularly in a contributory negligence jurisdiction like Virginia.
Third, you may seek Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) or Supplement Security Income (SSI) benefits if your electrical injury prevents you from returning to work. Learn how to apply for disability here.
An electrocution accident lawyer will help you evaluate all sources of compensation to help you improve your quality of life after an injury.
Personal injury cases resulting from electrocution or electric shock usually involve multiple parties who may be held liable.
An investigation by an electrocution accident lawyer may reveal that one or more of the following entities are at fault:
You may bring a claim seeking compensation for electric shock injuries against one or more of these people or entities.
As with other accident types, the range for personal injury settlements and workers compensation settlements for electrical shock and electrocution varies depending on countless factors.
In addition, electrical injury cases often involve multiple defendants. Therefore, your settlement strategy for timing and when to resolve claims against some defendants (rather than keeping all the defendants in the case until the end) impacts your recovery.
However, settlements for electrocution and electric shock can be large because these incidents often result in severe injuries and lifelong disability. Indeed, many settlements for electrical injuries range from $250,000 to $2,000,000 or more.
Getting electrocuted at work, at home, or while enjoying yourself at an entertainment venue, such as a concert hall or nightclub, can cause severe, long-term health problems.
As your electrical injury attorney, our law firm will evaluate all possible sources of compensation to help you regain your health, financial security, and dignity.
Call now to get your life back on track: (757) 810-5614 or (804) 251-1620. With offices in Virginia (Richmond and Newport News), Maryland (Baltimore, Hagerstown, and Cambridge), and Florida, we help electrical injury victims nationwide.
We are accepting workers compensation and personal injury cases where electric shock resulted in catastrophic injury or wrongful death.