Airport Injuries: Who Bears Responsibility if One Occurs?

There are hundreds of airports around the country. You have the largest and most famous ones, like JFK, Hartsfield-Jackson, and Dulles, but you might also fly into or out of any of the much smaller ones. They are usually bustling places with travelers hurrying to catch flights or sitting down to grab a bite to eat before making their next connection.

In these busy atmospheres, injuries can sometimes occur. If they do, that is unfortunate, but these situations can also raise an interesting question. Who bears responsibility if you hurt yourself while on airport property?

Airport injuries typically require a premises liability lawyer if you feel you have just cause to sue the facility. However, in some instances, that might prove pointless. In this article, we’ll talk about injuries in airports.

We’ll discuss some common ones, how they happen, how to avoid them, and who might bear responsibility if one does occur. 

Common Airport Injuries

If you’re hurrying from one flight to another, maybe you’re walking fast, but perhaps you’re in a full-on run through the terminal, dodging slower-moving individuals while yelling for them to get out of your way. That’s not exactly friendly or socially responsible behavior, but perhaps you know there is not another flight to your destination for hours. You don’t want to have to sit in those uncomfortable airport seats while you wait for the next one. 

Falling when running through airports happens relatively often. You might see someone take a tumble if they trip or slip while running. They may also run someone over who doesn’t get out of the way fast enough.

You can sometimes injure yourself on a moving walkway in an airport. You might fall while going up or down an escalator. It’s possible that one of those little motorized airport carts could hit you while they’re moving passengers or luggage from place to place. 

How Do These Injuries Happen?

When an airport injury happens, maybe it’s because you’re not paying attention. Perhaps you didn’t hear a cart coming up behind you, for instance, and the driver did not stop in time and struck you.

If you’re on a moving walkway or escalator, maybe you took a bad step. 

In such cases, you might bruise or cut yourself. However, you may also sustain a more serious injury sometimes. For example, if you fall while on an escalator heading up, and a piece of your clothing gets caught in the teeth of the mechanism, it might mangle a body part before you can get to your feet again. 

A nasty tumble down some stairs in an airport can cause a traumatic brain injury or a broken bone. Often, if you’re not paying attention or hurrying to catch a flight, you can hurt yourself severely in the space of a single moment. 

How to Avoid Hurting Yourself in Airports

Often, you can avoid the worst airport injuries simply by paying attention to your surroundings. If you’re mindful of what’s around you, avoiding the most dangerous situations usually becomes possible. 

You should always avoid running through airports, even if you feel you’re about to miss your flight. Maybe you don’t want to have to wait for the next one and to change your plans for the day, but slight inconvenience always beats a serious injury. Keep that in mind the next time you’re about to make a mad dash from one terminal to another.

Who Can You Blame if You Hurt Yourself in an Airport?

As for who you can hold responsible if you injure yourself in an airport, several considerations will come into play. How exactly the injury happened will usually determine whether you must blame yourself or whether you can potentially point to another party.  Let’s say one of those motorized airport carts hits you and injures you. Did the driver yell for you to get out of the way beforehand, or did they otherwise try to warn you before the collision? If they gave you no warning before hitting you, or you didn’t hear them shouting, you might potentially have a winnable lawsuit.

If you hurt yourself while on an escalator or moving walkway, did you do so because of a malfunction or because of your own actions? You might file a lawsuit against the airport or its maintenance department if a malfunction occurred. However, if an escalator harmed you because you had your smartphone out at the time to check your next flight time or to send a text message, you probably will not win a lawsuit if you choose to file one. 

You Must Consult with a Lawyer in These Situations

Talking to a lawyer after one of these accidents probably makes sense if you feel like you can file a lawsuit against a particular airport employee or the airport in general. If you think a faulty piece of equipment in the airport hurt you, you might have a case. If the airport didn’t put up a sign saying to avoid a moving walkway or escalator because it wasn’t working correctly, that’s probably a lawsuit you can win. 

If someone driving a motorized cart didn’t warn you to get out of the way, you might potentially file a lawsuit. However, you might have to sue that particular person and not the airport itself. 

Such cases can involve all kinds of complications. For instance, perhaps you hurt yourself on an escalator in an airport, and you didn’t see a sign saying it was out of order. Maybe the legal team for the airport will argue that it did routine maintenance and the airport couldn’t know about a malfunction before it occurred. 

In other injury situations, perhaps you don’t have enough physical evidence of what you allege happened. You might need photographic evidence, official accident reports, or eyewitnesses to prove your case. 

You can sometimes win these lawsuits, but consulting with a personal injury makes sense as a logical first step.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Aleksandra Djurdjevic          

Senior Content Creator

Aleksandra Djurdjevic is a senior writer and editor, covering snowboarding, skiing and trends in outdoor winter activities. She has previously worked as ESL teacher for English Tochka. Aleksandra graduated from the Comparative Literature department at the Faculty of Philosophy in Serbia. Aleksandra’s love for the mountains, getting out in the snow on her board, season after season, seeking wild snow adventures across the globe helps her continue to be a top expert at CSG.