Goals
The ultimate goal of these investigations is often to determine the legal liability for a fire or other accident for purposes of insurance subrogation or an injury lawsuit. Some examples include:
- Defective appliances: If a property fire was caused by an appliance which had a manufacturing or design defect (for example, a coffee maker overheating and igniting), making it unreasonably hazardous, the insurance company might attempt to collect the cost of the fire damage ("subrogate") from the manufacturer; if the fire caused personal injury or death, the injured party might also attempt an injury lawsuit against the manufacturer, in addition to the carrier of health or life insurance attempting subrogation.
- Improper workmanship: If, for example, an electrician made an improper installation in a house, leading to an electrical fault and fire, he or she could likewise be the target of subrogation or an injury lawsuit (for this reason, electricians are required to carry liability insurance).
- Electrical injury: If an electrical fault or unreasonably hazardous electrical system causes an electrical injury ("electrocution" if the injury is fatal), the party responsible for the electrical accident can be the target of insurance subrogation or an injury lawsuit.
- Equipment failure: if electrical equipment stops functioning, it can cause a loss of income (such as a factory losing productivity due to inoperative equipment) or additional damage (such as food products spoiling due to loss of refrigeration), and again be the subject of a subrogation or liability case. Liability in such a case can also include the cost of repairing or replacing the equipment, which can be substantial.
Read more about this topic: Forensic Electrical Engineering
Famous quotes containing the word goals:
“Our ego ideal is precious to us because it repairs a loss of our earlier childhood, the loss of our image of self as perfect and whole, the loss of a major portion of our infantile, limitless, ain’t-I-wonderful narcissism which we had to give up in the face of compelling reality. Modified and reshaped into ethical goals and moral standards and a vision of what at our finest we might be, our dream of perfection lives on—our lost narcissism lives on—in our ego ideal.”
—Judith Viorst (20th century)
“Whoever sincerely believes that elevated and distant goals are as little use to man as a cow, that “all of our problems” come from such goals, is left to eat, drink, sleep, or, when he gets sick of that, to run up to a chest and smash his forehead on its corner.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“We should stop looking to law to provide the final answer.... Law cannot save us from ourselves.... We have to go out and try to accomplish our goals and resolve disagreements by doing what we think is right. That energy and resourcefulness, not millions of legal cubicles, is what was great about America. Let judgment and personal conviction be important again.”
—Philip K. Howard, U.S. lawyer. The Death of Common Sense: How Law Is Suffocating America, pp. 186-87, Random House (1994)