Welding Accidents Lawyer

Welding accidents represent around 25 percent of all fatal accidents that occur in the workplace. This type of workplace accident also comprises one-third of all work-related amputations. The key for your construction accident attorney to present a persuasive workers’ compensation claim or civil lawsuit that seeks monetary damages is to determine the cause of your welding injuries. 

Electrocution

An intense electrical shock is one of the most common causes of welding accidents. Electrocution can come from two possible sources for a welder working at a construction site. First, a welder touches two metal parts that have an electrical current running between them. Second, welding electrocution can happen when a welder touches a part of the welding or electrical circuit at the same time the welder touches the exposed metal that is being welded.

Exposure to Toxic Fumes and Gases

Every day on the job, welders work close to toxic fumes and gases, such as base metals, base metal coatings, metal oxide compounds, and minerals like manganese. Prolonged exposure to toxic fumes and gases can lead to the development of acute respiratory diseases such as lung cancer. Because it takes time for respiratory diseases to develop symptoms, proving exposure to toxic fumes and gases caused a respiratory illness can be difficult to do.

Repetitive Motions

Welders often fall victim to repetitive motion injuries, especially repetitive motions of the arms and legs. Repetitive motion injuries can make it impossible to hold the equipment required to weld parts together. Welders also work long hours in cramped conditions, which frequently causes long-term back and neck pain.

Severe Burns

Welding involves working with extremely hot metals. Although you wear protective equipment to prevent serious burns, some metals reach temperatures that slice right through protective equipment to cause the worst type of burns. Carelessly handling molten metals causes severe burns that require months, if not years, to rehabilitate.

Optical Dangers

Welders wear super-tough protection for the eyes to prevent sparks and hot metal drops from saturating the air and damaging one or both eyes. There is also a high risk of suffering an eye injury caused by a welder’s flash, which is produced by a combination of infrared and ultraviolet radiation.

Fires/Explosions

The combination of extreme heat and the presence of toxic fumes and gases can trigger a flash fire or, worse, a deadly explosion. Fires and explosions represent one of the most common types of incidents that require the legal support of a welding accidents lawyer to file a civil lawsuit.

Knowing what to do after a welding accident can help you build the most convincing workers’ compensation claim or civil lawsuit that seeks monetary damages.

Receive Immediate Medical Care

Since many welding accidents produce serious or even life-threatening injuries, you might have no choice but to visit the nearest emergency medical center. Even if you feel healthy enough to remain on site, you eventually should get medical care to ensure you do not suffer from any lingering negative health consequences that were caused by a welding accident. Your welding accidents lawyer will make copies of every medical bill, as well as collect and organize your medical records for submission to your employer’s insurance company or the judge hearing a civil lawsuit.

Contact a Welding Accidents Attorney

Before you contact your employer or the insurance company responsible for processing a personal injury claim, you should schedule a free case evaluation with one of the construction accident lawyers at Morgan and Morgan. Your legal counselor coaches you on how to interact with your employer after a welding accident, as well as determines whether you have a strong enough case to file a civil lawsuit because of the negligence committed by another party.

Inform Your Employer

Informing your employer represents a mandatory step for the filing of a workers’ compensation claim. Your employer explains your rights according to state and federal laws, as well as hands you the paperwork you need to initiate the workers’ compensation process. Whether you file a workers’ comp claim or a civil lawsuit that seeks monetary damages, your employer should complete an incident report and send a copy of it to your welding accidents attorney.

Gather Physical Evidence

One of the many advantages of hiring one of the highly-rated construction accident lawyers from Morgan and Morgan is our law firm has recruited a large team of investigators to collect and organize physical evidence. Your attorney accompanies a Morgan and Morgan investigator to acquire video footage shot on site, as well as examine welding equipment to determine whether any of the equipment can be defined as defective. Interviewing witnesses can provide legal support for the evidence gathered at the scene of the construction site accident.

Although employers in every state but Texas are required to purchase workers’ compensation insurance, that does not mean your welding accident falls under the legal category of a workplace accident. Your construction accident attorney might discover evidence that your employer or the manufacturer of a defective welding tool might be legally liable for causing your injuries.

Proving negligence for a construction accident case involves demonstrating the presence of four legal elements.

Duty of Care

Duty of care means another party assumes legal responsibility for protecting you against a welding accident. The other party can be your employer or a manufacturer. For construction projects, the duty of care doctrine applies to both general and independent contractors. Proving your employer or a manufacturer must follow the duty of care legal doctrine represents the easiest element to prove negligence.

Breaching the Duty of Care Doctrine

For proving the second element of negligence, your Morgan and Morgan welding accidents lawyer must prove another party committed an act that violated the duty of care doctrine. For example, your employer might not have provided you with a secure platform in which to weld together several parts. Because the platform collapsed and you fell to the ground, your employer breached the duty of care doctrine.

Caused Your Injuries

A welding accident must have caused your injuries. This is important because the attorney representing the other party will try to show the court that you sustained your injuries from another type of accident, not a welding accident that transpired at a construction site. For example, let’s say you sustained burns caused by hot metal while welding together two parts. The other party’s lawyer might claim you sustained the burns earlier in the day while cooking breakfast over a hot stove.

Suffered Financial Losses

The last element of proving negligence also is relatively easy to do. You must link your injuries to financial losses, such as medical bills and lost wages. Your welding accidents lawyer will submit copies of your medical records and bills, which includes the dates of diagnostic tests, treatment programs, and physical therapy sessions. If the dates fall after the date of your welding accident, then your attorney has persuasive evidence to submit that shows your injuries caused financial losses.

The primary goal of your welding accidents lawyer is to help you recover your financial losses. You can receive compensation from your employer’s workers’ compensation insurance company or monetary damages awarded by a judge overseeing a civil lawsuit. If your attorney decides to file a lawsuit, you have the right to ask for three types of monetary damages.

Economic damages include tangible expenses such as medical bills, property damage, and lost wages. You have the right to request compensation for costs associated with diagnostic tests, treatment programs, and physical therapy sessions. If applicable, your legal counselor also asks for economic damages to pay for prescription medications and the purchase of an assistive device like a wheelchair.

Non-economic damages do not come with a price tag. Instead, they cover issues such as mental and emotional distress. Sustaining the injuries produced by a welding accident can leave both physical and emotional scars. To heal the emotional scars, your lawyer calculates a fair value for non-economic damages that uses a formula based partly on the value of your economic damages.

Punitive damages penalize the defendant for committing one or more acts of negligence.

To learn more about your legal options after a welding accident, schedule a free care evaluation today with one of the accomplished construction accident attorneys at Morgan and Morgan.