Stupid Lawsuit [Archive]

Buck

07-12-2005, 10:31 AM

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1525590,00.html

Fushigi

07-12-2005, 10:41 AM

Stupid is right. If that sort of thing flies, I can see the next lawsuits lining up:
- sue cities for providing carpool lanes
- sue companies who provide carpool and even parking subsidies
- sue the average citizen for not using their service

Tannin

07-12-2005, 11:04 AM

This is sort of reassuring. I mean, usually one would read that, sigh, and say "only in America". But I doubt that even an American lawyer would try that one on.

Or am I dreaming?

blakerwry

07-12-2005, 12:52 PM

It's cirtainly true you can sue anyone for anythign you please, however finding a lawyer who will support you and having a case that will not be thrown out in seconds is a completely different matter.

sechs

07-12-2005, 04:37 PM

I should sue the auto makers and petroleum companies for ruining public transit....

jtr1962

07-12-2005, 05:22 PM

Interesting but I'd say the lawsuit will go nowhere. What these people did basically amounts to carpooling, and they had valid reasons for doing so. Instead of suing, the bus company might have asked why did they choose to do this instead of taking the bus. I'm all for public transit. Always have been. However, in order to work public transit needs to be fast and frequent. Most people will accept a 10 or 15 minute time penalty in exchange for avoiding the need to drive. However, few would be willing to turn a 15 minute drive into a 2-hour odyssey.

We had a similar situation where I live a while back. There is a local 2.5 mile feeder bus route to the subway where I live. During rush hours buses usually run frequently (every 5 minutes or less) so you usually board a bus right away, and just wait until it finishes loading before leaving. However, during midday and especially late at night service is less frequent. After midnight it's only hourly. As a result people with cars or off-duty taxis sometimes picked up passengers at the subway station and ran the bus route during off hours, charging the same as the bus. This provided a needed service. The bus company of course tried to stop this practice but never asked why do people use it. After all, from a safety standpoint some of these cars/drivers certainly left something to be desired. The reason was simple-someone who just missed a bus didn't feel like waiting 15 or 20 minutes for the next one, which incidentally would take 20 minutes to run the route because it was packed with passengers (normal run time was around 12 to 15 minutes).

Anyway, with the elimination of two-fare zones once the token was replaced by the Metrocard this practice seems to have come to an end. I don't ride the subways regularly any more since I work at home so I can't say if the poor midday service has been addressed. Nevertheless, few if any people would be willing to pay what now amounts to an extra fare to a private car to save several minutes so the problem was partially solved. Actually, paying double fares was an inequity for those city residents not near a subway so this needed to be addressed anyway. Hopefully the relative lack of service was addressed as well. To increase midday ridership so as to justify more buses an off-peak fare was instituted but I don't know if it was successful or not. The private bus line which ran the route was recently taken over by the MTA so the off-peak fare is history. I believe they are studying the possibility of instituting it for the entire bus/subway network which is a good idea. Subway trains could be more frequent during midday as well but the ridership needs to be there. The problem isn't nearly as bad as with the bus line in question, though. I think the expresses are on 8 or 10 minute headways during midday. Since two lines run on the same track on the Queens Blvd line that means a train to Manhattan every 4 or 5 minutes. I can live with that even if I'd rather see a train every two minutes.

I venture to guess that if the bus company suing either lowered their fares or had better service the issue would be moot as well.

jtr1962

07-12-2005, 05:23 PM

I should sue the auto makers and petroleum companies for ruining public transit....
Find a good lawyer and I'll join you.

Santilli

07-12-2005, 09:01 PM

I hope they have SLAP suit law over there. In Kalifornia, if you bring a frivilous lawsuit, you not only get it thrown out of court, but you have to pay the othersides expenses, and you are barred from bringing the case in the state again...

Law was made to deal with a religous group that used to use frivilous lawsuits, and the expense, to destroy people, and their companies, or get what they wanted from the people...

s

e_dawg

07-16-2005, 01:22 AM

Santilli

07-16-2005, 02:21 AM

Canada also has some provisions like that in its legal system that prevents frivolous lawsuits... can't remember what it was, but you never see Canadians suing McDonald's for making them fat or for making the coffee too hot such that it burns when they spill it on their lap.

They could easily stop this sort of stupid lawsuit by putting the plaintiffs' faces on TV and announcing the reasons for their suit. These people (hopefully) would be ridiculed mercilessly whenever they went out in public.

McDonald's, over and over again, would serve coffee so hot, that you couldn't see the steam. this issue was brought up, in prior lawsuits, many times.
McDonalds ignored the law, the safety of their customers, and continued to serve coffee so hot, it would scald.

Ford had bean counters that figured it was cheaper to pay off people killed by the Pinto's exploding gas tank, then fix the design flaw.

Companies like this don't deserve punative damages, they deserve the same fate they gave their consumers. However, the legal system refuses to recognize Sicilian methods of equity, in the U.S.

s

Tannin

07-16-2005, 02:26 AM

Huh? Coffee is supposed to be hot. OK, I'm a tea drinker, but it's the same thing. If you serve me tea that isn't hot, I'll ask for my money back, and rightly so. If I want iced coffee, I'll ask for it.

PS: defenition of "hot": 100 degrees minus minimum loss inevitable due to pouring & etc. You minimise this loss as far as practicable by doing things like pre-warming the pot.

e_dawg

07-16-2005, 03:02 AM

That's ridiculous Greg. Coffee and tea is supposed to be hot. The kind of hot that everyone knows will burn you if you spill it on yourself like a clutz. In order to NOT burn skin, it would have to be served below 50 C (120 F). What coffee/tea drinker would drink stuff that tepid?

If someone spills coffee/tea on their lap, how is this McDonald's fault? Are people going to sue car companies for producing cars that exceed 50 mph because crashes above that speed are often fatal? Why aren't the liquor, wine, and beer makers being sued for every alcohol related death? Perhaps an example closer to home... what would you say if all the gun makers were sued for producing weapons that kill? Shouldn't they be in court every time someone gets shot?

e_dawg

07-16-2005, 03:11 AM

I hope you don't find my tone too aggressive, BTW... you know how it is on the Internet, it's hard to judge... forgot to throw in a dozen smilicons to lighten the mood :D 8) :P :mrgrn:

Tannin

07-16-2005, 03:39 AM

what would you say if all the gun makers were sued for producing weapons that kill? Shouldn't they be in court every time someone gets shot?

Well, yes. You see, the difference is that coffee is designed to be held in the hand and then drunk. You only get burned if you do something with it it wasn't designed for. (Pour it into your lap.)

Guns, on the other hand, are designed to shoot things. People get hurt if you do use it for the purpose it was designed for.

Ergo McDonalds should not be liable if you pour your hot, fresh coffee over your Brooks Brothers suit. Gun manufcturers do bear a share of the responsibility when you shoot your mother-in-law.

Unfortunately, the courts use crooked logic and only rarely is a prosecution successful.

Fushigi

07-16-2005, 07:58 AM

Are people going to sue car companies for producing cars that exceed 50 mph because crashes above that speed are often fatal? Why aren't the liquor, wine, and beer makers being sued for every alcohol related death? Perhaps an example closer to home... what would you say if all the gun makers were sued for producing weapons that kill? Shouldn't they be in court every time someone gets shot?And how about suing file distribution/P2P networks for people using them to distribute copyrighted materials, despite the many legit uses of such technology? Oops, that's already happened. (http://www.macsimumnews.com/index.php/archive/5608/)

Pradeep

07-16-2005, 08:02 AM

Guns, on the other hand, are designed to shoot things. People get hurt if you do use it for the purpose it was designed for.

Ergo McDonalds should not be liable if you pour your hot, fresh coffee over your Brooks Brothers suit. Gun manufcturers do bear a share of the responsibility when you shoot your mother-in-law.

Unfortunately, the courts use crooked logic and only rarely is a prosecution successful.

Guns are designed to shoot things. Clay targets, paper targets, bowling pins, even humans. Can be used for good - cop/armed citizen shoots home invader dead, or for evil - mass murder. Your MIL case could go either way :)

AFAIK there has never been a successful prosecution of a gun manufacturer for the misuse of it's products. Plenty of cases filed, but they are all dismissed before they reach trial.

Pradeep

07-16-2005, 08:05 AM

And how about suing file distribution/P2P networks for people using them to distribute copyrighted materials, despite the many legit uses of such technology? Oops, that's already happened. (http://www.macsimumnews.com/index.php/archive/5608/)

"Today, the Supreme Court clarified that, even when there is evidence of a substantial non-infringing use, where evidence shows statements or actions that promote infringement, liability may be found"

I think this was the key.

07-16-2005, 08:46 AM

Ford had bean counters that figured it was cheaper to pay off people killed by the Pinto's exploding gas tank, then fix the design flaw.

So they paid people off, and then they fixed the design flaw? Wouldn't it have been cheaper to go straight to the fix?

Pradeep

07-16-2005, 09:30 AM

I think there is a typo, he meant to say "than" rather then "then".

Pradeep

07-16-2005, 09:32 AM

eeek, damn typos.

I think there is a typo, he meant to say "than" rather than "then".

time

07-16-2005, 12:47 PM

Coffee and tea is supposed to be hot. The kind of hot that everyone knows will burn you if you spill it on yourself like a clutz. In order to NOT burn skin, it would have to be served below 50 C (120 F). What coffee/tea drinker would drink stuff that tepid?

You're a fair way off in your understanding of different temperatures (as is Tannin). There is a huge difference between the minor burn one would reasonably expect from a beverage spill and the third degree burns experienced by some unfortunate people who experienced sustained contact with 85C liquids.

Firstly, it's just not possible to achieve anywhere near 85C if you make coffee or tea yourself. The brewing temperature may start at 85-90C, but the brewing process lowers this - if you prewarm a teapot, probably to 70-80C. But once you pour into a china cup or mug, it will be down to 60-70C.

Then, of course, most people add milk or cream, and/or sugar, then stir it all around. I'd bet the end result will be 45-60C. That might cause pain, but not a burn.

Of course, the milk angle is one reason why coffee machines deliver coffee hotter than drinkable. But without any additives or stirring, into a styrofoam cup without any thermal mass to speak of, liquid might stay pretty close to 85C for a couple of minutes.

The effects of hot liquid on human skin can be exponentially related to temperature, eg, just a few degrees difference may reduce the exposure time before burning by ten times.

Incidentally, there's a proven link between consumption of very hot beverages and esophageal cancer. You can 'train' yourself to drink super hot drinks because regular consumption deadens the nerves in the mouth and throat. That doesn't mean you're not burning yourself, just that you can no longer feel it.

In the case of the lawsuits, I see the problem as being one of packaging. It can be quite tricky to get those pesky lids off without spilling the drink, which has always surprised me given how common they are. Also, perhaps better design could keep the coffee warm for longer and obviate the need to serve it so hot in the first place.

People are far more likely to be burnt at McDonalds than elsewhere because of their drive-through facilities. It's difficult to burn yourself standing up or sitting in a normal chair because your first instinct is to jump up or back, keeping the spill away from your skin. It's kinda hard to do that in a car with good bucket seats, which is what happened to the plaintiff - third degree burns to 6% of her body, skin grafts, multiple stays in hospital and obviously great pain.

Bozo

07-16-2005, 02:06 PM

"It's kinda hard to do that in a car with good bucket seats, which is what happened to the plaintiff - third degree burns to 6% of her body, skin grafts, multiple stays in hospital and obviously great pain."

This did not happen to the woman at McDonalds. She got a mild sunburn type of burn. (it's hard to get a severe burn from a hot [non boiling] liquid through a couple layers of clothing) The news media blew the whole deal right out of sight. Of course, the news media didn't report that after McDonalds appealed the absurd settlement, the case was thrown out by a higher court. Sensanalism sell papers, the truth doesn't.

Bozo :mrgrn:

Bozo

07-16-2005, 02:15 PM

If you Google the McDonalds lawsuit, you can find at least a dozen different versions what happened. Most can't even get the womwns age right or whether or not she was driving.
Until I talk to the woman, I don't believe any of it. :o

Bozo :mrgrn:

time

07-16-2005, 08:16 PM

Do you work for McDonalds or something? :P

There have been a number of cases of customers being injured by McDonalds coffee - 700 according to McDonalds themselves. The definitive lawsuit is widely referenced on Google (http://www.google.com/search?q=coffee+scalding&sourceid=opera&num=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8). There was no appeal because McDonalds settled after the first court.

And like I said, people don't seem to understand the effects of different temperatures.

Tannin

07-16-2005, 10:28 PM

If I pay money for a hot drink, I want a hot drink. If it ain't hot, I want my money back. Most people, I am sure, feel the same way. If they didn't, they would order iced coffee.

So, what you are saying, Time, is that this dumkopf ordered a hot drink, in the full knowledge that it was indeed hot, and fully expecting to have to take the lid off and then drink it in a moving car, and then she burned herself and she is blaming someone else?

What a moron.

Thre are four things the judge should do:

* Throw her stupid case out
* Fine her for wasting the court's time
* Have a serious chat to her lawyer, telling him not to be such a damn fool
* Take her driving licence away because she has already proved she's not fit to be in charge of a vehicle on public roads.

e_dawg

07-17-2005, 02:28 AM

Hmm... I think our temperature references are a bit different, time, but I will concede that the temps at McDonald's may have been a bit hotter than home brew with tea using a kettle > teapot > tea cup process, but I find it hard to believe that a person would sue someone else for their own stupidity. I guess sometimes you have to infringe on the rights of some to protect the stupid from themselves... (seriously)

-----------

In other news, have you heard about the john who contracted venereal disease and sued the pimp for procuring him an unclean woman? :)

time

07-17-2005, 10:52 AM

I don't want to embark on some sort of campaign here, but Tannin et al, what makes you think the victim did anything stupid?

She wasn't the driver, the car wasn't moving. Pray, what exactly did she do wrong? Became a customer of McDonalds, perhaps?

Please read the bloody Google link. :P

Bozo

07-17-2005, 12:41 PM

Like I said, you can find any answer your looking for.
Here http://lawandhelp.com/q298-2.htm it says there was an appeal.
another article says there was an appeal plus an out of court mediation.

Are they factual?????

Bozo :mrgrn:

Mercutio

07-17-2005, 02:23 PM

All I can say is, if I received third degree burns on my groin from a cup of coffee, I'd be suing everyone from the guy who made that pot to the bastard who grew the beans.

It'd be one thing if I spilled coffee and had a little boo-boo on my leg for a couple of days. Fine. But that's not what that woman sued for. A third degree burn is an injury I'd never want to experience, and it's not an injury I'd expect from anything that's served at a frickin' McDonalds.

As long as we're talking about stupid lawsuits, how about all the crap the RIAA does in the US? Suing one college kid for $90 BILLION dollars on the basis of their valuation of the MP3s on his computer, or inflating the valuation of music piracy by some multiplier of how fast the CD Burners in the defendant's computer is.

time

07-17-2005, 08:25 PM

... it says there was an appeal.
Sorry, I assumed a "trial court" was not an appellate court. I'm not familiar with the roles that different US courts play, so I thought it meant that the judge at the first trial reduced the damages awarded by the jury, as well as denying McDonalds leave to appeal.

Can you clarify?

Bozo

07-17-2005, 08:38 PM

I think you are correct on both accounts.
Like I said, you can find whatever answer you want on Google.
I'm confused. :o

Bozo :mrgrn:

PS: I don't drink my coffee that hot. I usually ask for some ice to temper it a bit. Anywhere that I get it.

jtr1962

07-17-2005, 09:00 PM

As long as we're talking about stupid lawsuits, how about all the crap the RIAA does in the US? Suing one college kid for $90 BILLION dollars on the basis of their valuation of the MP3s on his computer, or inflating the valuation of music piracy by some multiplier of how fast the CD Burners in the defendant's computer is.
I'd love to know what kind of storage this kid is using. Even going at the highly inflated price of $20 per song that means he had 45 million songs on his machine, and at an average of 5 MB each they would have required 225 TB! Atomic level storage anyone?

Seriously, on this issue songs should have copyrights that expire after a few years. By then the the recording studios have alreay made 99% of all the money they're ever going to make from that song. That would free the song up to legally become public domain on file-sharing networks. It would also greatly reduce the number of songs the RIAA needs to police. The above lawsuit is telling me maybe they're not doing this because they have a new business model-namely making money from copyright infringements instead of selling CDs. Totally disgusting. :tdown:

jtr1962

07-17-2005, 09:02 PM

Sorry, that's 4.5 million songs and 22.5 TB. Still a gargantuan amount of storage to fit in a PC.

Santilli

07-17-2005, 10:09 PM

Actually, I thought they were microwaving the coffee, making it so hot you could not see the steam. I buy Macs coffee, but take it out of their cups, which I consider incapable of holding the liquid, and, which quickly become too hot to hold.

As for the Pinto, they killed something like 250 people before the lawsuit was finally brought, and the court made Ford stop.

I think the concept here is there is an INDUSTRY STANDARD for coffee, and the heat it should be served at. People expect a certain level of heat, and plan accordingly. If a beverage is too hot, you can't see the steam, and you burn hell out of your mouth...causing you to drop the coffee...right in your lap...

s

Mercutio

07-17-2005, 10:31 PM

jtr, as I recall the basis of the suit wasn't just that the kid stored the songs, but that he'd functioned as a Napster supernode for x number of months, during which time some large number of people downloaded music from him. Still, $90 billion is such a fantastically enormous sum of money that it makes me wish the US had the concept of barratry.

e_dawg

07-18-2005, 01:06 AM

I don't want to embark on some sort of campaign here, but Tannin et al, what makes you think the victim did anything stupid?

Well perhaps stupid is too strong a word, but it was still her fault, and as an adult, she should be responsible for her own actions. Why is everyone absolving her of being reponsible for the consequences of her actions? Was she mentally retarded? Was she forced to pour the coffee on her lap by a disgruntled McDonald's employee? Is your average cup of coffee in any food service establishment normally that much colder to the point where someone would be shocked that spilling coffee on themselves actually causes their skin to burn? The answer to all the above, my friends, is a resounding no.

Should someone sue the concrete maker for making their concrete unusually hard if they slip and crack open their skull from the fall? Should someone sue Black & Decker if they suffer 3rd degree burns on their privates after tripping over the cord, knocking over the ironing board, and landing groin first on top of the exposed soleplate?

Coffee is usually served hot. Very, very hot. Scalding hot. Everybody knows that. Many other places that serve coffee or tea use extremely hot water as well. In fact, in most self-serve places, you put the tea bag in a styrofoam cup, and get ~80-85 C water from the hot water dispenser. If you spill it on yourself, who are you going to sue seeing as it's completely self-serve? BUNN, the water dispenser manufacturer? The cafeteria that provided you a convenient place at which to get your afternoon tea?

Santilli

07-18-2005, 01:24 AM

My last, very hot, cup of coffee, was served in a thin walled, non-proper cup.

It was VERY hot, but, transfering it to another cup worked.

s

Tea

07-18-2005, 05:22 AM

Wooah guys, you ain't gettin' it. This ain't rocket science, you know.

Hot drinks are supposed to be served hot. That's H O T HOT. That is 50% of the idea of a hot drink.

The other 50% of the idea is that is supposed to be a drink — i.e., a liquid containing water and (optionally) a variety of other substances which are generally thought to be pleasant-tasting, nutritious, mildly addictive, or otherwise rewarding to the average human.

Now this second part of the definition is actually more useful to us than it seems. It tells us that this thing we call a "drink" is essentially plain old water (plus some assorted impurities which, seeing as we are not talking about scotch or gin or brandy at the moment, can be pretty much ignored).

Water has many interesting chemical properties, but the one of particular interest to us here is that it freezes at 0 degrees and boils at 100 degrees, unless you want to start doing weird stuff like putting it in a pressure chamber. (There are some small variations to the exact temperatures, which are too minor to concern us in this context.)

If you change the temperature of water (with or without the tasty impurities) beyond those two end points (0 and 100), it isn't water anymore. It's either steam or ice. By definition, either way it ain't a drink if you do that: it's either a solid or a gas, and drinkz is alwayzliquid.

(Tea! Calm down!)

(Zorry.)

(And talk properly. Don't try to go so fast all the time.)

(I'm really sorry.)

Now where was I? Oh yes. We have established that a drink (any drink) is always, and can only ever be, somewhere between about 0 degrees and about 100 degrees. Now what about a "hot" drink? Well, we can certainly cross off anything much below blood temperature, because that's a different sort of drink called a "cold drink". A proper cold drink is served at between just barely above zero through to about 5 degrees, though some scungy places will sell you cans of Coca-Cola at about 15 to 20 degrees in the summer. You might buy one from those places, never two.

Then there are luke-warm drinks. Nobody likes those much (except maybe for warm milk when you are younger than me or older than Tannin - assuming that it's actually possible to be older than Tannin, that is) but they are served a little above blood temperature: in the 40 to 50 degree range.

After that, drinks fall into the "warm" category (which is OK for hot chocolate, not very good for tea or coffee unless it has lots of milk and sugar). Warm is up to about 55 degrees.

After that, it counts as "hot". (Remember hot? This is a thread about hot.)

And now we have to decide what "hot" means. First, we can cross off anything below 55 degrees (as that's only warm, possibly cold). Second, we can cross off anything over 100 degrees, as that's impossible unless it stops being a drink.

So where in the 55 to 99 degree spectrum is"hot"?

Well, we can work that out quite easily. Measure the temperature of the water you use to make your tea or coffee. You don't need a thermometer for this, as it just so happens that the temperature which every normal human being heats water to is the temperature at which water turns into steam: 100 degrees. You can tell when it reaches 100 degrees because it gets a whole lot of bubbles in it and you can see all the water vapour coming off it.

(You mean steam, Tea. Everyone knows that kettles steam.)

No I don't mean steam, Tannin. You can't see steam. Ever. Steam is invisible. Not sometimes, not if is a particular temperature instead of some other temperature, not only on rainy days or in winter — you can't see steam. Ever.

What you see is water vapour. Same as those fluffy white things up in the sky that rain on you sometimes. It's not steam.

Yes, a kettle steams, but you can't see it. All you can see is the bubbles in the water (these are steam, but you're only seeing the places where the water isn't, not the steam itself) and the water vapour that forms when the steam cools down and condenses back into tiny droplets of water floating in the air.

One of the things that makes water interesting is that, so long as it's in some sort of motion, it is pretty much the same temperature all the way through. This is particularly so in the case of a boiling kettle, as the heat is applied near the bottom, and the heated water rises to the top, making room for the slightly cooler water to flow to the bottom and get heated up so that it rises to the top, and around and around we go.

So when the kettle boils, the water is at exactly 100 degrees.

(But what if I boil the kettle, on an old-fashioned fire, let's say, so that it doesn't switch itself off, and thenkeep it on the fire? It has to get hotter than 100. 100 plus more heat = more than 100 degrees.)

Nope. Doesn't work like that. The fire transmits energy into the water, and the energy heats the water up to begin with, but once you get to 100 degrees, the water starts to turn into steam instead. The energy put into it by the fire is exactly balanced by the energy consumed by the water-steam transformation. If you add more energy (e.g., put another log on the fire or turn the gas up) then more water turns into steam every second but (and here is the really important bit) the temperature of the actual water doesn't change.

If you want to change the temperature of the water past 100 degrees, then you have to use pressure to prevent it changing into steam. This pressure thing is how steam engines work. Conversely, if you went up on top of Mount Everest, where the air pressure is very low, you couldn't have a proper hot drink at all, as water boils at around 72 degrees up there. By the time you poured it into a cup, it would be not much better than luke-warm.

Kettles don't use pressure. Ergo, boiling kettle water is always 100 degrees worth of hot. (Unless you live in Colorado or somewhere else up high, in which case boiling water is only about 95 degrees because of the lower air pressure.)

Santilli's talk about "too hot to see the steam" doesn't make sense. Even if we translate it to "too hot to see the water vapour", it still] doesn't make sense, unless we presuppose some kind of pressure cooker (which is silly) or some other way of getting ordinary water up well over 100 degrees (which isn't actually as silly as it sounds - more on this in a little while unless I get bored and go watch TV or something instead).

Every normal household, in other words, makes hot drinks at the same temperature: 100 degrees.

After that, there is some loss as the water is cooled by the air as you pour (5 degrees maybe? 10?); by the contact with the cup (probably about the same amount), and finally by letting the drink stand for an appropriate amount of time until it reaches the perfect drinking temperature, which varies from one individual to another, but is roughly 60 degrees.

The key point here is that hot drinks have to be poured at as close as possible to 100 degrees, or else by the time the person gets to drink them, they ain't hot anymore. What you going to do? Ban kettles?

She did do something stupid, two things in fact. (a) she spilled hot drink all over herself (which was an accident, no doubt, and could happen to anyone, but is something we normally train children not to do by the time they are five years old. (b) She blamed somebody else for her own mistake! Call it stupid, or call it morally culpable, or call it both, there is no way known that she has any sort of a case.

Lord knows I am no fan of McDonalds - I hate the bastards unreservedly - but in this case they did exactly the same thing that I would do, and exactly the same thing that any normal civilised human being would do: she asked for coffee so they boiled water and made coffee with it. If she didn't want a hot drink, she could have ordered a Coke.

If I went to your house and you made me a cup of tea with cold water I'd .... well, no, I'd be polite about it because you are a nice person, but I wouldn't bother asking for a second cup.

Santilli

07-18-2005, 06:28 AM

Tannin:

I thought the neat thing about heating a liquid is the heat starts at the bottom, and goes towards to top. This action limits the amount of energy that can be transfered into a liquid, without it boiling.

Now, microwaves allow you to transfer energy into liquids, without the normal top to bottom convection that occurs. In other words, it's similar to heating a liquid from the bottom, under pressure. Also, IIRC, the coffee "holders" these companies use, do use pressure. They keep the liquid from boiling off by using a closed container, so, when the liquid trys to boil, the area above the coffee is under pressure, and boiling does not occur. In other words, the holding containers are filled, then the top area is sealed, and the only way the liquid is allowed out of the container is through the spout. This also prevents the coffee from oxidizing, and going bad. At the same time, the coffee is heated from the bottom, and cooked, to a very high temperature, higher then would be obtained by a normal pressure enviornment. Anyway, I worked in restaurants for about 25 years, and I'm pretty familiar with the sorts of holding containers used.

The main reason for the current type containers is to prevent oxidation, so the company gets it's entire use of the brewed coffee, without loosing money on it.

s

Bozo

07-18-2005, 07:06 AM

In the one article that I read on Google, the woman involed had no intensions of sueing until she was introduced to a lawyer by a third party.

Lawyers..........

Bozo :mrgrn:

Fushigi

07-18-2005, 08:32 AM

Sorry, but for once I'm not even finishing one of Tea's long posts. I buy coffee; I make coffee. I can tell you with a 100% degree of certainty that the coffee I used to get from McD's was at least 20-30 degrees F hotter than I would get from 1) my home coffeepot (a Bunn), 2) the coffeemaker at the office, and 3) any coffeehouse I've ever purchased from, including Starbucks, Caribou, Gloria Jeans, etc. and finally 4) various restaurants and other establishments.

When I buy or make coffee, I can usually sip it right away and out and out gulp it within a couple of minutes. With McD's brew I had to wait at least 10-15 minutes before even sipping. Attempting to drink before it had cooled down always resulted in a minor burn on my toungue, the roof of my mouth, and/or a scalded feeling in my upper throat. On the occasions when I actually ate there, I mostly couldn't even start the cofee until I had finished the entire meal it was supposed to go with. Adding cold 'cream' didn't seem to help much.

That is too hot. I don't care what temp ranges you define; when I can drink coffee from pretty much anywhere in the world (well, OK, just North America and Europe) right away yet I have to wait 10+ minutes for McD's coffee to cool before I can drink it, McD's was serving it too hot.

BTW, you may have noticed my past-tense with reference to visiting McDonalds. I have not purchased anything from there since 2001. They've never been a favorite, but the food seemed to be slipping in quality and, as a final straw, I had three errors on a single order (short-changed, undercooked beef, and regular cola when I ordered diet). After that, I wrote them off as hopeless.

Now, regarding the case, the woman did not take proper precautions WRT proper care and handling of a hot beverage. However, the beverage itself was served hotter than industry norms. Both parties should share the blame, but I'd say McD's has a higher degree of responsibility as it could be argued their product was faulty and that the results of her inadequate precautions would not have been nearly as severe if the coffee had been at a more normal temperature..

Tannin

07-18-2005, 09:03 AM

You can't get water hotter than 100 degrees. It is that simple.

Santilli

07-18-2005, 09:44 AM

Fushigi

07-18-2005, 10:38 AM

You can't get water hotter than 100 degrees. It is that simple.While in a liquid state and under 1 atmosphere of pressure, this is correct. But how hot water can get doesn't really matter at all. What matters is the appropriate serving temperature for a substance that is going to be consumed by a human being.

At what temperature does the human tongue, the lining of the mouth, and the throat burn or otherwise take damage? At what temperature does skin, since the case in question was a spill and not a consumption, burn or take on burn-like symptoms?

Buck

07-18-2005, 11:11 AM

What matters is the reasonableness of both parties. It's common sense that a hot drink contains hot liquids that are potentially dangerous. If I'm going to serve a hot drink, I'll take reasonable safety precautions, just like the consumer should take reasonable precautions when handling the product.

Tannin

07-18-2005, 11:12 AM

Second point first. Slightly less than 100 degrees. In the case of orally ingested liquids, rather closer to 100 than you might imagine. This is for four reasons:

(a) you get used to it through drinking tea, coffee, and hot soup, and eating steaks still sizzling off the grill. (Try ticking your finger in your coffee - it's bloody hot!)
(b) you reduce the temperature by sipping, as opposed to drinking it straight down the way you might scull a glass of beer. When sipping, you typically inhale in such a way as to extrude a long, thin "finger" of liquid which, being thin, cools fairly quickly, and you also suck cool air at the same time: the draft of air you suck in as you sip cools the liquid quite a lot.
(c) the liquid forms a bolus; a more-or-less ball-shaped form that is cooler on the outside (see a and b above) than it is on the inside. The hottest inner part of the bolus doesn't contact skin right away, and has had time to cool a fracton by the time it does.
(d) The mouth is already coated in slightly sticky liquid (spit). This presumably also serves an insulating function, and no doubt helps conduct the heat away to a larger surface area.

Point (b) is a key point: it is this sipping process that makes a good cup of tea (or coffee, or even scotch) "taste" as good as it does. What you are really doing is more like "smelling" the tea than tasting it: you are picking up all sorts of subtle flavour delights from the aroma of the air you suck in as you sip your tea. It works much, much better when it's hot. This is why so many people hate cold tea/coffee - it doesn't have anything like the same "flavour". (Actually aroma, but we call it flavour.) It works with scotch (I assume) because the alcohol in the scotch is volatile and thus serves the same function that the heat in the tea/coffee does: transferring flavours into the air around the liquid as you sip.

(I'll get to my other point in another post.)

Buck

07-18-2005, 11:19 AM

Did someone say Scotch?

Bartender

07-18-2005, 11:20 AM

Quiet down Buck, Tannin is trying to make a point.

Tannin

07-18-2005, 11:35 AM

But how hot water can get doesn't really matter at all. What matters is the appropriate serving temperature for a substance that is going to be consumed by a human being.

This would be logical, Fushigi, if and only if typical people in ordinary life didn't routinely serve hot drinks at a temperature very close to 100 degrees. We already know how the ordinary person makes coffee: heat the water to exactly 100 degrees (i.e., boil the kettle), pour, and serve. That is done in countles millions of homes and offices around the world every single day.

The only factors that come into play are:
* if you take milk or not
* if you take sugar (the metal spoon must drop the temperature quite a bit)
* how cold your cup is
* how much thermal inertia your cup has
* how efficiently your cup insulates against cooling
* air temperature and time - the colder the room the faster it cools
* altitude and air pressure effects (make boiling point very slightly higher or lower)

This brings me to Tea's point that Santilli picked up on and Tea forgot to mention: microwave heating.

Now I forget the exact details, and I'm too lazy to look them up. but when you boil water, unless you heat the thing incredibly rapidly with something like an explosion, it doesn't all boil at the same time. Why not? Didn't Tea claim that it is all at the same temperature?

Yup. But actually it's a bit more complicated than that. When the kettle first starts getting hot, you can hear it 'singing". Lots of steam bubbles are forming, and then starting to rise, but cooling through contact with as-yet still liquid water, and condensing again, each one with a tiny "pop" sound. These bubbles are in fact a little bit hotter than the water surrounding them - just hot enough to vaporise.

But when the water is nearly boiling, the kettle stops singing! Why? Shouldn't it sing louder when it's at 99 degress than it does at 94 degrees? You'd think so. But we know it doesn't, because it goes suddenly quiet just a few seconds before it boils. And the reason, it turns out, is that as it approaches 100 degrees, the activity in the kettle increases; more and more little steam bubbles form and pop out, and al this activity stirs the water up and mixes it very effectively - so effectively that all the water is at just about exactly the same temperature, not just approximately the same temperature. There are no cold spots, and equally there are no extra-hot spots: none of the water is a little bit over 100 degrees, so the bubbles stop forming and the kettle stops singing.

But only for a moment, of course. The element adds a bit more heat, and all of a sudden it's boiling over.

Ahh, Bartender. Since you are here, I wonder if you would mind organising me a small scotch. Just a little one, and then I'll go to bed.

Santilli

07-18-2005, 11:37 AM

This is a drive through problem. If you anticipate serving coffee in such a manner, you should provide a proper container, and anticipate that people are going to spill the coffee. If that's the case, then the coffee should not be served at boiling, or very near it, first since coffee is NOT supposed to be boiled, and second, it's clearly a possibility that the person is going to spill coffee in a moving car. Also, when you have the first 650 cases of injury, one might consider a slight drop in temperature might be a good idea, or an upgrade in cup quality, etc.

I think this suit went through because Macs was aware of the problem, had it brought to them in a reasonable fashion, and refused to change anything to remedy the problem. Many businesses are so completely uncaring, as we all know. The funny part is, from my last experience, I don't think the Pacifica Macs has changed ANYTHING.

The only difference is, thanks to all the publicity, I treat Macs coffee with a respect I don't other coffees I buy. I make sure I have a high quality container, take plenty of cream, and make sure when I drink it, the car is stopped. I'm also very much aware that the flimsy cup they give, unlike say Starbucks, that comes with a wrap for the cup, so when it gets hot, you have another layer of insulation.

The lawsuit was a good thing if for no other reason to make all aware that
Macs coffee is much hotter, and you have to take precautions to deal with, and extra care. Too bad Macs can't take the same precautions in serving the product...

s

Bartender

07-18-2005, 11:43 AM

Ahh, Bartender. Since you are here, I wonder if you would mind organising me a small scotch. Just a little one, and then I'll go to bed.
A short Lismore, neat, for our late-night friend.

Buck

07-18-2005, 11:49 AM

Santilli,

If anyone were to serve an unusually hot beverage in an inadequate drink vessel, I would certainly find that unreasonable. However, since I (nor do I allow any of my passengers) do not drink or eat in my car, it is a moot point for me. But, for countless millions in this country, it is probably very important, and basic precautions should be taken.

PS: Personally, the cup and sleeve from Starbucks becomes a bit thin with freshly poured hot water for a cup of tea. I usually ask for an additional cup of ice to help cool it down.

Bartender

07-18-2005, 11:53 AM

Tea

07-18-2005, 11:54 AM

Tannin, you forgot about the microwave thing.

Here is a little experiment you can do at home. (Carefully!) Take a large, clean coffee cup. Select one with a nice smooth, glossy lining (none of your rustic stoneware crockery here, something with a smooth finish on the inside and no rough edges or corners).

Fill it up with clean water (any temperature below boiling - cold will do) and microwave it. DON'T use a microwave with a turrntable. It has to sit still. You will have to experiment a bit to find out how long to cook it for, but you are aiming to microwave it on high for as long as you possibly can without making it boil all over the place.

Once you have wiped up all the water that spat itself all over the microwave when you took it just a little bit too far and worked out that with your tap water and your microwave in cup X filled to point Y it takes Z seconds to boil it all over the shop, start again and give it Z-5 seconds.

You now have water at maybe 98 or 99 degrees, right? Nope. It's well over that.

Here is how you test. (Carefully! You can scald youself quite easily doing this.) Take the cup out of the micowave. Add something to it. Anything you like: a few drops of cold water, some sugar, a few grains of sand, an spoon - it doesn't matter what you add.

All of a sudden, the thing boils over like crazy!

After you have explained to your wife why there is water all over the kitchen floor and wrapped a handkerchief around your scaled hand, you can start trying to figure out what happened.

Any takers? I'm going to find a tree and put my head down .... no .. there is going to be a frost. I think I'll sleep human-style tonight.

In a bed

With blankets.

PS: Tannin mumbled something about "that was delightful, I've never had Lismore before, tell the Bartender thankyoufrommeandnowI'mreallysleepygoodnighteveryo ne".

time

07-18-2005, 12:19 PM

Before we go any further, Tea's home experiment is an incredibly foolish thing to advocate, and I hope no-one here is gullible enough to try it.

Never mind scalds to the hand - you're looking at a potential explosion and therefore your face is at risk. This neat little article (http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/~jw/superheating.html) explains the basics, such as:

If one litre of water is superheated by only 1 °C (ie if it is heated to 101 °C without boiling), it is in an unstable state, and it can suddenly produce about 3 litres of steam. The rapid production of a substantial quantity of steam within the bulk of the water will cause it to boil vigorously and possibly to appear to explode. The result is boiling water flying at speed out of the container.

Santilli

07-18-2005, 12:29 PM

Well, the MW's superheat the liquid, past boiling, by increasing the vibration of the molecules, without disturbing them, unlike an external heat source.

When you try and remove it, this changes the position of the molecules, and the molecules are free to vibrate into air, and escape.

IIRC, Macs was using MWave ovens to heat coffee in certain stores, as well.

s

Fushigi

07-18-2005, 12:58 PM

...first since coffee is NOT supposed to be boiled...

Indeed, it should be brewed with 93-degree Celsius water.The temp at which coffee or any beverage is brewed is unrelated to the whole discussion. What matters is the temp at which the beverage is served. McD's has a history of serving coffee at a temperature markedly higher than pretty much everyone else. That higher temp, be it from microwaving (I've not seen that done in a restaraunt but wouldn't doubt that it could be) or other means is the central issue. The served product is too hot to consume right away and is hot enough to cause burns if accidentally spilled.

time

07-18-2005, 01:16 PM

Secondly, Tannin's claim that "You can't get water hotter than 100 degrees. It is that simple." is nonsense. To quote from the superheating article, "in the absence of bubbles, water can be heated above 100 °C". Although more likely in microwave ovens, it happens in saucepans too. Santilli has also pointed out that pressurization is a common catering technique that allows water to be heated well past 100°C.

Tea's little lecture about water's chemical properties is riddled with errors. The 0 and 100 points on the Celsius scale relate to pure water at 1 atmosphere. Change either, and the points vary widely. For example, adding salt to water both lowers the freezing point and raises the boiling point. You can't just "ignore some assorted impurities".

If you change the temperature of water (with or without the tasty impurities) beyond those two end points (0 and 100), it isn't water anymore. It's either steam or ice.
...
One of the things that makes water interesting is that, so long as it's in some sort of motion, it is pretty much the same temperature all the way through.
No, no, no. Have you never heard of temperature stratification in liquids? How do you explain temperature variations in the ocean, even in waves at the beach? Once you realize that temperature does vary, you can see that water can exist in more than one phase at a time.

BTW, steam is water vapour, and what you see is not water vapour, but mist, i.e. condensed water - the liquid phase.

time

07-18-2005, 01:32 PM

...first since coffee is NOT supposed to be boiled...

Indeed, it should be brewed with 93-degree Celsius water. Any cooler, and some of the aromatics that make up the flavor will not be released. Hotter, and some undesirable elements will be pulled from the grounds, affecting the taste.

I can't keep up with this. :(

Santilli, who worked in the restaurant trade for 20 years, is of course correct. The Bartender needs to recheck his sources. 93C would be appropriate for black tea, but not much else. There's a commercial incentive to brew at the hottest possible temperature, but it doesn't produce the best coffee.

And I forgot to point out yet another fallacious claim by Tea: water from a kettle will not pour at 100C. As soon as it switches off, the boiling slows - anyone can oberve this. By her own definition, if it ain't boiling merrily, it ain't at 100C. :P

Bartender

07-18-2005, 02:04 PM

The Bartender needs to recheck his sources. 93C would be appropriate for black tea, but not much else.

Rechecked, I'm correct. Based on water type, you could figure in a range of 88-96°C. :D

time

07-18-2005, 02:16 PM

Finally, there's Tea's drink serving temperature guidelines.

A proper cold drink is served at between just barely above zero through to about 5 degrees
No, barely above zero would be an 'ice-cold' drink. Cold drinks such as white wine are often served at 10C.

Then there are luke-warm drinks. Nobody likes those much (except maybe for warm milk when you are younger than me ...) but they are served a little above blood temperature: in the 40 to 50 degree range.
Human breast milk is about 30C. Skin temperature varies widely, but averages 33C. Anything above that will feel warm.

A hot beverage becomes drinkable for most people between 50C and 60C. Much above 60C (140F), you'll burn your mouth. The thing is, you may not realize you are doing so (a point I made earlier).

Tannin's tea drinking tips are creative, but mostly the product of a fevered imagination. For instance, what about your lips? Unless you drool a lot, they're not covered by magical moisture-repellant saliva, and I'm fairly sure that even a long, thin "finger" of liquid has to cross them.

Sipping an 85C drink to check how hot it is would burn those lips, no question.

I think the bottom line is that Tannin and Tea have pulled a lot of stuff out of their collective ass. How about some research instead?

time

07-18-2005, 02:24 PM

Here's a description of water at various temperatures, from a tea brewing guide:

60°C - Slightest sign of bubbles and steam; water not too hot to touch
70°C - Small bubbles developed, slow steam starts to rise
90°C - Full bubbles developed, brisk steam rising
95°C - Roaring boil

time

07-18-2005, 02:29 PM

Here's the best account I've found, compiled from the WSJ and Newsweek:

On February 27, 1992, Stella Liebeck, her son Jim and her grandson Chris Tiano left Santa Fe at dawn to drive to the Albuquerque airport to drop off Jim for an early flight. Stella, 79 years old but "quite spry," had just retired from a long career as a department store sales clerk. After leaving the airport, Stella and Chris, who was driving, stopped at a McDonald's drive-up window for breakfast. After they had received their food, Chris pulled over and parked the car so Stella could add some cream and sugar to her coffee. She looked for a place to set the coffee cup down, but there was no cup-holder in the Ford Probe and the dashboard was slanted. Since both hands were needed to remove the lid and add the cream and sugar, she placed the coffee cup between her knees to keep it secure while she removed the lid. While she was attempting to remove the lid, the coffee spilled into her lap.

She screamed as the scalding coffee soaked into and through her sweat suit and scorched her skin. Chris leaped from the car to help. She yanked at her sweat suit and squirmed in the bucket seat, in excruciating pain. Chris raced her to the emergency room, but by the time they arrived severe third-degree burns had spread across her inner thighs, buttocks, groin and labia. Third-degree burns are "full thickness" skin burns that char and blacken the skin and permanently destroy the skin and nerves. Stella remained in the hospital for seven days, went to her daughter's house for three weeks to recuperate, and then returned to the hospital for skin grafts. The grafts were almost as painful as the burns, her daughter said. "She was in tremendous pain; I didn't know if she'd survive this." She had lost 20 pounds, which brought her weight down to only 83 pounds, and was practically immobilized. She was disabled for two years and has permanent scars over 16 percent of her body.

Stella had never initiated a lawsuit and was not looking to initiate one now. However, she and her family thought McDonald's should pay $15,000 to $20,000 to cover her daughter's out-of-pocket expenses (which were about $2000) and wages lost while staying home to take care of her and to reimburse Medicare for over $10,000 of medical expenses. About six months after the accident, Stella's daughter wrote to McDonald's to request reimbursement for these items and to ask that McDonald's lower the temperature of its coffee. Although McDonald's had previously settled many claims by other coffee burn victims for amounts up to and exceeding $500,000, it offered Stella and her family only $800.

While she had been recuperating in her daughter's house, Stella had met a Santa Fe couple who had formerly lived in Texas. The couple knew a Houston attorney, Reed Morgan, who had litigated a coffee-burn lawsuit against McDonald's in 1986 on behalf of a woman in Houston who had also suffered third-degree burns. In that case, Mr. Morgan had had a survey taken of coffee temperatures at 20 McDonald's restaurants and 18 other fast-food restaurants such as Dairy Queen, Dunkin' Donuts and Wendy's. Nine of the 12 highest readings were from McDonald's restaurants. Mr. Morgan also deposed Christopher Appleton, a quality-assurance manager at McDonald's headquarters, who said "he was aware of this risk . . . and had no plans to turn down the heat." McDonald's settled the Texas case for $27,500.

Having had her request for minimal compensation rebuffed by McDonald's, Stella and her family contacted Morgan to have him file a lawsuit against McDonald's for her medical expenses and pain and suffering. Morgan had a survey taken of coffee temperatures at numerous fast-food restaurants around Albuquerque, which indicated that other restaurants all served their coffee at least 20 degrees lower than the approximately 180 degrees at which McDonald's served its coffee. He also obtained McDonald's operating and training manual, which requires its coffee to be brewed at 195 to 205 degrees and held at 180 to 190 degrees for optimal taste.

Morgan offered to settle the case for $300,000, and said later he would have taken half that, but McDonald's did not want to settle. A court-appointed pre-trial mediator, a former judge, recommended that McDonald's settle for $225,000 and said that a jury would be likely to award that amount. McDonald's lawyer did not show up for the mediation, and McDonald's rejected the mediator's recommendation.

Before the trial began, the jurors' thoughts about the case were pretty much the same as those the media and public subsequently had after the verdict became known. The jury foreman, Jerry Goens, said he "wasn't convinced as to why I needed to be there to settle a coffee spill." Juror Roxanne Bell said "I was just insulted. The whole thing sounded ridiculous to me." Juror Betsy Farnham said she also had thought that the suit was frivolous.

But that was before they saw the gruesome photographs of Stella's charred skin, learned of her seven days in the hospital and the subsequent skin grafts, and heard testimony from Dr. Charles Baxter, a renowned burn expert from Southwestern Medical School in Dallas, that coffee at 170 degrees would cause second-degree burns within 3.5 seconds of hitting the skin. Juror Jack Elliott went home and told his wife and daughters "don't drink coffee in the car, at least not hot."

The jury was informed that McDonald's operations and training manual required its coffee to be brewed at 195 to 205 degrees and held at 180 to 190 degrees for optimal taste, and that this was 40 to 50 degrees hotter than coffee made at home. A McDonald's expert argued that any coffee hotter than 130 degrees could produce third-degree burns, so it did not matter that McDonald's coffee was hotter. But a plaintiff's expert testified that lowering the serving temperature to about 160 degrees could make a big difference, because it takes less than three seconds to produce a third-degree burn at 190 degrees, about 12 to 15 seconds at 180 degrees, and about 20 seconds at 160 degrees. According to Stella's son-in-law, McDonald's experts "admitted the[coffee] was too hot for consumption when sold. They did not contest the fact that it took 25 minutes to cool to a drinkable temperature."

Morgan wanted to introduce photographs of the third-degree burns caused by McDonald's coffee that had been suffered by his previous Houston client, as well as photographs of a California woman's second- and third-degree burns that occurred in 1990 when a McDonald's employee spilled hot coffee into her car (the latter case was settled for $230,000). McDonald's lawyer, Tracy McGee, objected: "First-person accounts by sundry women whose nether regions have been scorched by McDonald's coffee might well be worthy of Oprah," she wrote in a motion to the judge, "[b]ut they have no place in a court of law." The judge excluded the photographs and the injured women's testimony, but allowed Morgan to mention the cases.

The jury was further surprised to learn that during the prior ten years McDonald's had received more than 700 reports of coffee burns ranging from mild to third-degree, and had settled burn claims for amounts up to and exceeding $500,000. (Although it is not clear whether it was part of the trial record, the Shriners Burn Institute had complained to the fast-food industry about the serious scalding injuries caused by super-heated coffee.) Christopher Appleton, the McDonald's quality-assurance manager who previously had been deposed in the Texas case, testified that despite the complaints and despite knowing that its coffee was causing serious burns when spilled, McDonald's had not consulted burn experts and had no plans to change any of its coffee policies or procedures. "There are more serious dangers in restaurants," he said. He noted that McDonald's consumer surveys indicated that people like their coffee very hot. He acknowledged that most people would not realize that severe burns were possible with coffee that hot, but stated that McDonald's had decided not to warn its customers about this possibility. (McDonald's had a tiny Caution: Contents Hot label on its cups, which did not impress juror Betty Farnham, who said that she needed her glasses to read it.)

McDonald's safety consultant, Robert Knaff, a human-factors engineer, asserted that 700 complaints, which was about one for every 24 million cups of McDonald's coffee sold, was "basically trivially different from zero." He also misspoke: "It's just that a burn is a very trivial thing - [I mean] a burn is a very terrible thing."

By this time the jurors' views of the case had shifted radically. "Each statistic is somebody badly burned," said juror Betty Farnham. "That [dismissing them as statistically insignificant] really made me angry. There was a person behind every number and I don't think [McDonald's] was attaching enough importance to that." Juror Jack Elliott said he began to realize that the case was about "callous disregard for the safety of the people."

In her closing argument, McGee, the defense lawyer, acknowledged that McDonald's coffee was hot, but argued that was how customers wanted it. She insisted that Stella had only herself to blame. She should not have put the cup between her knees. She should have leapt out of the bucket seat immediately after the spill and removed her clothes. She also argued that the injury was so severe due to Stella's age, since older skin is thinner and thus more vulnerable to injury. "The real question," McGee concluded, ". . . is how far you want our society to go to restrict what most of us enjoy and accept."

The jury took only four hours to reach its verdict. "The facts were so overwhelmingly against the company," said Betty Farnham. "They were not taking care of their consumers." Farnham, who had started the case thinking the suit was frivolous, pushed for a total award of $9.6 million. The jury fixed Stella's actual damages for medical bills and pain and suffering at $200,000, which it reduced to $160,000 after determining that she was contributorily negligent and bore 20% of the overall responsibility for her injury. It also found that McDonald's had engaged in willful, wanton, reckless or malicious conduct, as required for an award of punitive damages. Adopting Morgan's suggestion that punitive damages be assessed equal to one or two days' worth of McDonald's coffee sales, which Morgan estimated to be $1.35 million per day, the jury awarded Stella $2.7 million in punitive damages. "It was our way of saying, 'Hey, open your eyes. People are getting burned'," juror Bell said later.

The trial judge, who, like the Liebecks, was a self-described conservative Republican, agreed with the liability finding, but a month after the verdict he reduced the punitive damages to $480,000 - three times the compensatory damages. He too wanted to let McDonald's know that it "was appropriate to punish and deter" its corporate coffee policy. "This was not a runaway [jury]," he told Newsweek, "I was there." After some additional post-trial maneuvering, the parties settled the case for an undisclosed lesser amount.

Bartender

07-18-2005, 02:44 PM

I think the bottom line is that Tannin and Tea have pulled a lot of stuff out of their collective ass. How about some research instead?

:rofl:

Mercutio

07-18-2005, 03:33 PM

This thread just gets better every time I see it.

Santilli

07-18-2005, 06:12 PM

Corporate stupidity. Someone probably took a survey of coffee drinkers, and the majority said they like "hot" coffee. Some idiot figured that if 'Hot" is good, scaliding is better. :roll: :roll: :excl:

From that, corporate offices probably bought coffee makers, and holders, and microwaves, and issued the directive listed above, giving target temps, etc.

The said part of all this is that if the coffee takes 25 minutes to cool in their cup, how can anyone hold the cup? I mean they use cheap, cardboard cups that become too hot to hold VERY quickly, and, I'm talking about this having just bought coffee from them on Friday. Amazing that they just don't GET IT.
Even with this law suit, their product is not noticeably cooler then prior...

The coffee doesn't even taste that good, since I think it's at that level when made when you get a bit too much acid, and not enough body...
But, after surfing, it is hot...
s
:wink:

Santilli

07-18-2005, 06:20 PM

By the way, the holders usually combine a big brewing area, a basket with the coffee in it, and a sprinkler to distribute water. Once brewed, the liquid sits over heat, and a heavy lid is on top of the machine. For the steam to escape, the pressure has to be sufficent to lift the heavy stainless top, since no other openings are present.

That's one kind of coffee holder. Macs uses a small box system, that appears to be designed as a self contained steel box, and you put it over a heating system, which keeps the coffee very hot, and, minimizes oxidation. In other words, invision a closed steel container, opened only by the spigot, with a vacum above, caused only by some coffee being extracted. In other words, the initial container is filled full, with no room for air, put over heat, and kept very hot. In the last scenario, how hot could the coffee get before boiling???

s
:eekers:

Handruin

07-18-2005, 07:10 PM

I read the post, and I do feel bad for the lady, but come on...could she not feel the heat through the cup? Did she not realize that if the coffee by-chance spilled while trying to take off the lid in between your thighs that it might hurt? I still don't feel this should have been a law suite. Now, if McDonald's cups were faulty, and would break open releasing the contents of hot coffee, then sure...that might be grounds for some compensation.

I see very little difference between this case, and a case where you brew your own coffee at home and spill it in your crotch. Does that mean if you brew it at home, you can sue Mr. Coffee?

Last I knew, McDonald's does not microwave their coffee. It's brewed like normal coffee. McDonald's was my first place of employment when I turned 16. Not a proud moment, but I don't regret working there.

07-18-2005, 07:38 PM

I have to say I've never come across a drink hotter than McDonald's coffee. And in general, only rarely do I come across food that makes people more irritable than the majority of stuff you find at Rotten Ronald's. Any worse than that and we're bordering on illness.

A side note to myself:

If you would prefer another option -- rather than the one we discussed earlier -- then I'm afraid you're out of luck.

You see, I have already dyed the orangutan blue.

At first I rebuffed the idea, but then, after having thought about it for quite some time, I realized that it was too good an opportunity to pass by. Other than the possibility of a brief jail sentence, I don't foresee any problems. Honestly though, I don't think jail is likely. It will be clear to anyone that this orangutan is more attractive now than it was before.

Of course, if you disagree, then you're free to argue. But if you really don't like the result, rather than dwell on it, you can always provide an alternate color. Perhaps a nice shade of green?

But in a final defense of my choice, please remember that the only thing better than, hotter than, higher than, greater than, cleaner than, and more spectacular than a blue orangutan ... is an orangutan with a good command of the English language.

Tea

07-19-2005, 12:28 AM

Time, your posts are both accurate and to the point. Unfortunately, where they are accurate they are not to the point, and where they are to the point they are not accurate.

Your microwave scaremongering is graphic, but merely repeats exactly what I already said in my original post.

10C ain't cold, it's room temperature. You've been living in Queensland too long. (Right here and now, 10C is warmer than room temperature.)

Tea is brewed at boiling point. Always. If you don't boil the water, you don't get the flavour. (There are some other types of tea, quite uncommon in the west, that are not infused in the ordinary way.)

Damn! I'm out of time. More demolition of more silly stuff from the Banana State when I finish work. Great thread though.

Santilli

07-19-2005, 03:11 AM

I guess it depends on which Macs you go to. The one in Fremont was using styrfoam cups, and Bloomfield coffee makers, that don't keep coffee under pressure.

Keep in mind, that same Macs, about 4 months ago, had a pressure coffee system, as I described above.

Also, the one in Pacifica has different cups, and much hotter coffee.

The economics of pain....

s

e_dawg

07-20-2005, 01:32 AM

Tea is brewed at boiling point. Always. If you don't boil the water, you don't get the flavour. (There are some other types of tea, quite uncommon in the west, that are not infused in the ordinary way.)

Don't agree with that... Let's look at two typical tea making scenarios at home:

1. The immediate pour into the tea cup or tea pot, straight from the kettle as soon as the water has boiled method. When the water comes out of the kettle, it is already below 95 C if you pour it shortly after the heat input is removed. Unless the water is STILL at a roaring boil AFTER it's been poured into the tea cup/pot, it ain't at 100 C while brewing. I'd put the brewing temperature in the low 90's in this situation.

2. The I'll pour the water into the tea cup or pot when I'm ready method. It drops rapidly to 85-90 C if you wait a bit before you pour it -- as it would be if you had an electric kettle like most N. American households. When the water reaches boiling, most electric kettles automatically shut off. Most people don't come running over; they return to the kettle after they finish up whatever it is they were doing. Figure about 85 C at this point, then after pouring it into a coffee mug or tea cup, the brewing starts at about 80 C.

The ideal temperature range for brewing tea, from various sources on the internet, appears to be ~80-95 C. ~95 C for black teas, and ~80 C for green teas. So the "no wait" method is best for brewing the more common black teas.

Now, as for what temperature you should serve tea at, let's first talk about how hot you can possibly serve it in the first place. If you follow method #1 above, the hottest you could possibly serve it is in the low 90's. If you take sugar with your tea and use a spoon to stir it, we have to be at or below 90 by now. If you want milk too, there is no way the tea is above 80 C.

As for what temperature your mouth burns at, it depends on how used to drinking very hot liquids you are. Veteran coffee/tea drinkers who drink it as hot as possible (as our simian friend) can handle liquids in the 70's no problem. Mere mortals hit their limit in the 60's.

Tea

07-20-2005, 03:54 AM

Yes, and no, Doggy One.

I'll take the no first. Tea drinkers always pour from a boiling kettle, starting from within a few seconds of the electrical cut-out. If you've let it go for a while while you finished doing something, you flick the switch back on to bring it back up to 100 degrees while you fetch the cups and stuff. Everybody does this. Everybody that's a tea drinker, anyway.

(I am prepared to consider favourably the proposition that there aren't any tea drinkers in or near the United States, by the way. Not real ones, at any rate. Why else would so many Americans drink that horrible coffee muck?)

(OK, OK. Coffee isn't muck. I actually like coffee quite a lot, especially a really hot, fairly weak, long black, but Tannin won't let me drink it because he thinks it makes me too hyperactive. I also like Greek coffee and cappachin ... capechen ... capichino ... milky coffee with bubbles in it, but I'm not allowed to have those either.)

Now, back to temperatures. Yup, I'll accept 95 degrees as a reasonable estimate of the temperature the water is when it hits the tea in the cup or pot. It starts at 100 (or very close to it), pouring must reduce that by something like 5 to 10 degrees. Note, however, that the best tea (and you can taste the difference easily) is made with water as hot as possible. This is because, unlike coffee, tea is an infusion: the flavour is not released by cold water. Coffee, being a suspension, is just a matter of mixing up the granules in the right proportions. (That's instant coffee. I'll defer to real coffee drinkers about the brewed sort.)

I am, by the way, an expert on tea. It's my middle ... er .. it's my first na .... no it's my last .... um ... it's my name.

Fushigi

07-20-2005, 07:39 AM

I'll say it again:
The temp at which coffee or any beverage is brewed is unrelated to the whole discussion. What matters is the temp at which the beverage is served.

Tea

07-20-2005, 09:52 AM

You can say it as many times as you like, Fushigi, and it will remain as pointless a comment as it was the first time you made it: hot drinks are normally served immediately.

What are you telling me you do? Go to the kitchen to make a guest a cup of coffee, then stand around looking at the fridge magnets for ten minutes while you wait for it to reach perfect drinking temperature, then hand it to them?

Of course not. You boil the kettle (~100 degrees), pour the coffee (~90 to 95 degrees), hand it to your guest (~85 to 90 degrees). Then you both sit down and talk for a while while the drink reaches the ideal drinking temperature.

Or you make a cup of tea for yourself. Same deal. You boil the kettle (~100 degrees), pour the tea (~90 to 95 degrees), carry it over to your desk, and plonk it there until such time as you surface from whatever task was occupying your mind and remember to drink it. (In Tannin's case, this usually results in him drinking it stone cold 45 minutes later. He's very forgetful.)

The temperature a hot drink is brewed at, in other words, is the temperature it is served at. Always. (Bar whatever cooling takes place in the 5 seconds it takes you to pass the cup over: 0.1 degrees maybe.) (Also except in very bad food joints where the service is so slow that it goes cold while the waitress serves 17 other people and answers the telephone.)

Bozo

07-20-2005, 10:00 AM

When I make tea, I put a few tea bags in the coffe pot where the coffee usually goes. Then add water and press the start button. The water is brought to boiling and dripped through the tea bags.

Serving temperature is somewhat less than boiling. Although I usually poor it over ice for iced tea. (it's above 90F here)

Question. In Oz it is winter now, right? Do you get snow?

Bozo :mrgrn:

Tannin

07-20-2005, 10:02 AM

I am not!

(Not what?)

I don't know. I'm just not.

(You're not?)

No. Not at all.

(Are you sure?)

Quite sure. Not in the slightest, you silly ape.

(Not in the slightest what?)

I can't remember.

Tea

07-20-2005, 10:39 AM

Snow Bozo? Not usually, not unless you're above about 3000 feet.

Ballarat, regarded as one of the coldest non-alpine places in Australia, is about 1000 feet above sea level. Apart from making the kettle boil at 99 degrees instead of 100 (by my rough calculation), it also lets us in for snow sometimes. I suppose you get flakes of snow in the air two or three times in the average year, and it will last long enough to settle on the ground an inch or two or even three thick maybe every third or fourth year. Something like that.

Very little of Australia is much above 2000 feet high: the continent is incredibly old and it is basically just worn flat, all except for a bit of a long, narrow fringe all the way down the east coast (relatively young mountains thrust upwards about 50 or 60 million years ago by rifting between the Australian and New Zealand plates, if I rememember correctly).

The Great Dividing Range, as it is called, is quite narrow, and rarely gets above two or three thousand feet. There are several peaks around the 5000 foot mark scattered along it, and a fairly extensive area on the Victoria - New South Wales border that is more or less that high all over, with peaks up to 7000 feet.

But that's it. (Outside Tasmania, which also has mountains, plenty of them and up to 5000 feet or so, but which tends to be quite mild in winter despite being further south - it's surrounded by sea, and that keeps it cool in summer, warm in winter.)

We would have quite regular snow, in other words, if almost the entire country wasn't so low-lying.

You probably think of Australia as being a long way south, sort of balancing the position of Europe and North America. I know I tend to do that, even though I know it's not so. Ballarat (in southern Victoria, the southern-most mainland state) is somewhere around the 37th parallel - i.e., about as far from the equator as San Francisco, or Washington, or the northernmost coast of North Africa.

We have a huge problem here in that we have only a very small amount of alpine country, and it contains a great variety of plants and animals that can live nowhere else (the rest of the continent is too hot and dry for them now). Global warming is already having a major impact on these areas, but there is nothing we can do about it, except pray that the major greenhouse gas producers in the world (primarily the United States) get their act together before it's too late, if it isn't already too late.

Anyway, on the one hand we have low-lying landforms that tend to produce higher temperatures than you'd otherwise expect. But on the other hand, we are a long way further north than most people realise. And on the other, other hand, the southern hemisphere is, on average, quite a lot colder than the northern hemisphere, roughly 10 degrees colder at or near the pole.

How cold does it get in winter in San Francisco or the southern-most Greek islands? I know Washington gets bloody cold sometimes, but then the continental USA has weird weather patterns because of the funnel effect of the two great mountain ranges running down either coast (real mountains, not the tired little worn-down pimples we have). The cold Arctic air gets directed further south than would otherwise be the case because it gets trapped between the Rockies and the other ones on the other side that I dare not spell - Applesomethingorother.

Buck

07-20-2005, 12:51 PM

(I am prepared to consider favourably the proposition that there aren't any tea drinkers in or near the United States, by the way. Not real ones, at any rate.)

Typical ape, using generalities like 'any tea drinkers...not real ones at any rate'. Granted it is not as wide spread as one sees in the British Empire, but there are true tea drinkers just the same.

PS: Once the kettle switches off, the water immediately stops bubbling, isn't that a sign of water dropping below 100C?

PPS: Have you bothered calculating the heat of loose leaf tea brewing in a pot for a few minutes, even with a tea cozy?

mubs

07-20-2005, 01:32 PM

Typical ape, using generalities like 'any tea drinkers...not real ones at any rate'.
Seconded.

My wife is an avid tea drinker, and so is her family (my family and I are coffee drinkers). She makes it the Indian way - chai - milk, tea and water all boiled together, strained, and drunk. Sometimes the sugar is added to the boiling stuff, sometimes later to the cup.

She's one of those odd people who likes coffee in the morning, and tea in the afternoon. Usually people stick with one or the other. Like people who are dog lovers, or cat lovers. People that like both cats and dogs (like me) are a small minority.

Bozo

07-20-2005, 03:04 PM

Thanks Tea :D

You're right, I thought os Australia as being wayyyy south.

Bozo :mrgrn:

07-20-2005, 05:38 PM

You boil the water. And yes, if the kettle switches off before you're ready to deal with it, you turn it back on so that you are guaranteed to be working with boiling water. But then you pour the boiling water into what's known as a teapot, which is where the teabag(s) is (are). At that point you leave the teapot alone for a precise period of time. How long depends on the taste you are searching for and the type of tea you have, but with the people I know, it's exactly 3 minutes. Then and only then do you pour the tea to start the process of serving it (which may or may not involve cream and/or sugar).

So while you can say that you typically serve hot tea close to the temperature you brewed it at, that does not necessarily mean that the temperature you brewed it at is going to average 90+ C. As a result, the temperature the tea is served at may be substantially less than the initial boiling temperature. Still hot enough to burn? Sure it's still possible ... depends a bit on the person and the exact temperature. But near boiling? Heck no.

There are plenty of possible variations. It's tea. If you are so inclined, make some, and make it how you like it.

Mercutio

07-20-2005, 06:28 PM

Not to change the subject, but here's another great example of legislative excellence:
Guy forms a corporation to claim money earmarked for a non-existant business (http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/metro/index.ssf?/base/news-10/1121835811282890.xml).

Santilli

07-21-2005, 06:40 AM

PLEASE!!! This is Louisiana :excl: The home of a legal system based on the Napoleonic Code. It' puts property rights over humans, not a shock, considering French History. You trespass, you are fair game, and, this includes police. Despite that, it has very high property crime, last time I checked.

An ex-girlfriend moved down, and lived in a mansion/prison, since going out was a danger.

If there is a state that should have been allowed to succeed, it was, and is, Louisiana. Sicily is less corrupt.

:mrgrn:

s

Tannin

07-21-2005, 06:44 AM

The only thing I know about Louisiana is a movie I happen to have seen two or three times. Title "Blaze Star", or something similar. You probably know it. You are saying it ain't too far away from the truth then, Greg?

Tannin

07-21-2005, 06:52 AM

Santilli

07-21-2005, 07:43 AM

Tannin:

"Blaze IS a true story. :eekers: :lol: :excl:

Little later in time, and rather then being committed to a mental institution,
he'd get the Bill Clinton award. Blaze was much too much of lady to be called a Monica, and, when Long died in 1960, he left 50k to Blaze, who refused to accept it.

Paul Newman was great as Long. Excellent movie. Any state based on French law,...

Well, the article as poorly written as it is, is none the less rather funny.

I thought only Enron could do stuff like that, not a state legislature..

Check that, I live in Kalifornia, where the legislature spends money like drunken sailors, on all the wrong causes...

s

Tannin

07-21-2005, 09:05 AM

Yeah, it was a great movie. I'll watch it again one day.

You know, in the movie, Louisana in the 1950s reminded me a lot of Queensland in the 1980s. Thank St Pete that the old bugger is dead. (Peterson, I mean, not Long.)

mubs

07-21-2005, 11:53 AM

Re your link, Merc, I can't claim to fully understand the article, largely because, whoever Michelle Krupa is, she hasn't got the faintest idea of how to write in English. She claims to be a journalist? Hoolie doolie! I'd rather read an insurance policy or a phone book. Either one has clearer sentence structure.
Unfortunately, more and more stuff I read in the press these days is of this quality. You can read for 5 whole minutes and not have the faintest idea what the piece is about. When I was a child, I was told to read the newspaper to improve my communication skills and English. Not true anymore.

Easier to understand but corruption of the language nevertheless are other examples. Even "reputable" newspapers and magazines write about the prosecutor who poured over legal books (sweat, probably), and the accused who pled guilty. Job listings abound that are looking for a "Managing Principle" who is familiar with project management principals.

Beam me up, Scotty.

time

07-21-2005, 12:01 PM

He can't, he just died.

Mercutio

07-21-2005, 12:41 PM

The Big Easy is another cool movie set in New Orleans.

mubs

07-21-2005, 01:07 PM

He can't, he just died.
Yeah, I read about it. All things eventually must pass.

Santilli

07-21-2005, 02:19 PM

Mayor Daly is supposed to have run Chicago slightly below even Italian corruption standards...

:mrgrn:

I have hope. Even Barbara Boxer can recognize, and support, the recent socialist decision in Kelo, allowing any city to take your property and condemn it, then give it to a developer, if it stands to 'benefit' the community, which really means the developer just has to buy the politician...

s

"Dear Mr. Santilli:

Thank you for contacting me regarding
eminent domain and the recent U.S. Supreme Court
ruling in Kelo v. City of New London. I
appreciate the opportunity to respond to your
concerns about this important issue.

Although the government has the right to
appropriate private property for public use
through eminent domain, the founders of our
great nation provided protections against the
abuse of this right. These protections are
included in the Fifth Amendment of the U.S.
Constitution, which allows the government to
seize private property only for public use and
requires that the owner of the confiscated
property be justly compensated.

In its Kelo decision, the Supreme Court
found that the government may seize the private
property of one owner and transfer that property
to another private owner if this transfer would
benefit the community through increased economic
development.

I believe that the Court's finding
violates the private property rights that the
Founders fought so hard to protect. That is why
I am a cosponsor of S.1313, the Protection of
Homes, Small Businesses, and Private Property
Act of 2005. This bipartisan bill would protect
homes, small businesses, and other private
property by limiting the power of eminent
domain. Rest assured, I remain committed to
protecting the property rights of all Americans.

Thank you again for contacting me about
this issue. Please do not hesitate to contact
me again in the future about this or any other
issue that concerns you.

Sincerely,

Barbara Boxer
United States Senator"

She's only off a little bit. The founders protected us against the Federal Government, not out state, or local city governments. However, the 14th Amendment was intended to give all the protections of the Bill of Rights, to the people, against their state and local governments. After the civil war, the Supreme Court ruled, in the Slaughter House Cases, 1873, that the 14th Amendment didn't mean what it said, with the result we had another 100 years of oppression and hate for blacks, in the south.

This case is so obviously against the Constitution, both in literal view, and
intended goal, that a sitting Supreme Court Justice, Stephens in this case, should be impeached on the basis of this decision, for failing to uphold his
office.

Bozo

07-21-2005, 02:36 PM

Here in PA, it's been reported that last month the politicians voted themselves a raise of a minimum 16%. To get this passed, they had to change the wording in the states constitution (??) to pass a raise this high. After the raise went through they voted to change the constitution back. This was all done at 2AM on the sneak.
The major TV, radio, and newspapers reported the raise, but I'm looking for proof on the law change. Just rumors so far.

Bozo :mrgrn:

Santilli

07-21-2005, 03:21 PM

We've got a conservative assemblyman out here and we are going back and forth on this.

I'd like to see legislature saleries tied to the same level as the average teachers salary in the same state. To compensate for the paycut, minimize meeting time, so they can only do a limited amount of damage. Everything is fuxored here anyway, so give them 3 -6 months a year to meet, to slow down their change to socialism...

s

Fushigi

07-21-2005, 03:41 PM

I'd like to see legislature saleries tied to the same level as the average teachers salary in the same state. To compensate for the paycut, minimize meeting time, so they can only do a limited amount of damage.Looks like Ahnold is losing the love (http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=584&e=2&u=/nm/20050721/pl_nm/politics_schwarzenegger_dc).

Nice idea on mating congressional salaries to teacher.

Bozo

07-22-2005, 04:13 AM

Congress's saleries should be same as the average blue collar salery in his home state.

Bozo :mrgrn:

Santilli

07-22-2005, 07:53 AM

Arnold got set up on this deal. First off, who cares about advertizing for health food supps? All of a sudden, the Kalifornia legislature does, since the guys making money on the stuff are Arnold's employer. What a crock.
"The institute conducted its poll of 2,502 California adult residents in English, Spanish, Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese from June 28 through July 12."

That comment out of the article makes me REALLY wonder what the sample was, percentage wise.

None the less, Arnold hasn't endeared himself to the majority of Kalifornians, since he's attacked education, even if it's a political move, to get the legislature, to move.

s

jtr1962

07-22-2005, 10:31 AM

Santilli

07-22-2005, 04:19 PM

I'd like to see legislature saleries tied to the same level as the average teachers salary in the same state. To compensate for the paycut, minimize meeting time, so they can only do a limited amount of damage. Everything is fuxored here anyway, so give them 3 -6 months a year to meet, to slow down their change to socialism...

I'd like to see their salaries equal to the average wage along with a clause forbidding outside income of any kind (let's see them try to make it on $25K). :diablo: This way it's in their best interests to raise the standards of living for everyone. Beyond getting reelected, right now they really have no incentive at all to do well for their constituents.

As has become clear, it's the RICH constituients that tend to be able to 'help' our legislators along.

As socialist an idea as the average wage is, I like it. Let the legislator feel that new tax he just passed, or the bridge toll he just increased, on the average guys salary. Excellent idea. :mrgrn:

s

blakerwry

07-23-2005, 10:37 PM

Did you hear about the congressman from TX who is trying to make it illegal for the city of Philedelphia to setup low cost/affordable internet to areas who currently are not serviced well by private industry... he just so happens to be on the board @ SBC...

talk about someone who should be shot for conflict of interests...