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RYLANDS v FLETCHER - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Claimant leased a shop next to a theatre from the defendant
      - The shop suffered flood damage when pipes from the theatre’s sprinkler system burst due to icy weather conditions
      - D was not liable in RvF action
      - It was decided that the sprinkler system was also for the benefit of the claimant who was ruled to have consented to it as it had been installed before the lease was signed
  - - - Ds parked their bus on their parking space, having drained the tank of fuel
      - Stranger removed fuel cap and child was injured when another child threw a match into the tank igniting flames
      - Claim was made under RvF but D was not liable die to the act of a stranger
  - - - D made three artificial ornamental lakes by damming a natural stream
      - Freak thunderstorms accompanied by torrential rain broke the banks of the artificial lakes - water destroyed bridges on claimant’s land
      - Ds were not liable as extreme weather was amounted to an act of God
- - - - An unknown person on water taps and blocked plugholes on the defendant’s premises, causing damage to the flat below
      - D was not held liable for in RvF as the use of water in domestic pipes was a natural use of the land
    - - The defendants stored strips of metal foil used in the manufacture of electrical components
      - Some strips blew off the defendant’s land onto an electricity substation, causing a power failure
      - It was held that the use of land was a natural use by the defendant because of the benefit from the manufacture received by the local population
- - - - Inspector checking interior of munitions factory and was injured together with a number of workers when a shell exploded
      - HoL decided that RvF did not apply as there was ‘no escape at all of the relevant kind’
  - - - Defendants stored chemicals for their leather tanning business
      - There were frequent spillages and over the years, chemicals seeped into concrete floors and into soil below
      - An area where claimants extracted water became polluted and involved the claimants spending over a million pounds to move its operation
      - They claimed this cost from the defendants but HoL decided that the damage was not foreseeable and too remote from the site of the spillage (type of damage needs to be foreseeable, not the escape)